


Scales and Vectors

by praesaepe



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Also when I say noodle dragons I mean it this fic is noodle dragon-ccentric, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, As long as I stick to my notes and outline I guess, Canon-Typical Violence, Chubby McCree, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Genji Shimada is a Little Shit, I'm bad at tagging but these are the basics and I'll add tags as they go, M/M, Noodle Dragons, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Shimada Brothers, Slow Burn, Trans Angela "Mercy" Ziegler, Trans Genji Shimada, Trans Jesse McCree, don't know how much air time they'll get but they're there, minor ships are fareeha/satya sombramaker and anahardt, so i've fallen in love with concept mercy and have some Plans, warned for in the chapter it occurs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-17
Updated: 2017-10-06
Packaged: 2018-11-14 23:20:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 31,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11218329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/praesaepe/pseuds/praesaepe
Summary: “Why can only you and Father see my dragon, Hanzo?” Genji asked. He carefully picked a light blue flower with enough of the stem left to put it in Hanzo’s hair. “Yesterday Yuito walked right through Kaba like she wasn’t even there. Are they really invisible to other people when they’re not protecting us?” The flower slid easily into place among the others.“When I got my dragons, Father explained to me that only those we love can see them outside of battle,” Hanzo said. “Someone we truly love, not some passing infatuation. You and I and Father are family and all care for each other deeply; the fact that we can see each other’s dragons proves this. I would trust either of you with my life.”--Hanzo Shimada hasn't seen his dragons outside of combat in ten years, ever since he "killed" his brother. When Genji shows up, alive and hoping to rebuild their relationship, Hanzo can't refuse his request. He makes his way to Watchpoint Gibraltar to join the fledgling (and still illegal) Overwatch. What he wants: to make peace with Genji and himself. What he gets: so much more than that.This is a story about brothers, dragons, and recovery. And a silly cowboy with a ridiculous belt buckle.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! This is my first multichapter fic in a looooooooong time, and the first one that I'll be posting as I go, rather than when it's all finished up. My goal is updating once a week, on Saturdays, but given work and life being a bit hard and hectic for me right now, I might switch that to once every other week. We'll see. I'll say right up front that it's highly likely there won't be a chapter next week because I'm working three days of it and I'll be out of town with friends the other four days. Not a good way to start, I know, but hey, it happens. Hopefully the next chapter will come the Saturday after!  
> This fic was inspired by a little fluffy idea I had (what if the noodle version of the dragons were only visible to people the "host" considered family) and grew to be so much more than that. I actually have like 1600 words of a scene that now won't even fit in this version of the story lmao.  
> Another thing: I know there's been a few issues with characterizations that fall back on racist tropes and relationships that... don't seem the healthiest. My goal is to try and avoid this as much as possible and make these characters as rounded and real as possible, but I'm white and I've definitely got ideas ingrained into me that I don't immediately realize are racist. Please do not hesitate to call me out on anything! It isn't ever going to be intentional and I am perfectly fine with being told off so I can fix it.
> 
> This is beta read by the lovely and wonderful [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/). She's a godsend and is going to help me make this fic the best I can for all of you. Also, shout out to [cin](http://thetiniestcicada.tumblr.com/) for being supportive and encouraging me to write as well as screaming over my first chapter when I shared it with them :D
> 
> HMU on tumblr at [praesaepe](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/). My askbox is always open. Kudos and comments are greatly appreciated!!

“Why can only you and Father see my dragon, Hanzo?”

Hanzo and Genji sat beneath one of the cherry trees in the courtyard, watching their dragons tussle with each other in the long grass, scales glittering in the warm spring sun. Hanzo patiently folded his hands in his lap as Genji ran his fingers through Hanzo’s long hair. The younger boy had put it up in braids multiple times, taking it down and and starting over after each unsatisfactory attempt. The trees had yet to bloom, so Genji had no pink blossoms to weave into the braid he had decided was adequate. He had, however, made a few forays to the edges of the garden to gather the few wildflowers that had taken root before the gardeners came for them and razed the area back to its immaculate - and in the boys’ eyes, boring - state. He was threading these in Hanzo’s hair with the clumsy fingers of a twelve year old, tongue poking out of his mouth in concentration, when he asked the question.

Hanzo hummed consideringly before answering. “The dragons are spirits,” Hanzo said. “They have been protecting our family for centuries, and not even the highest ranking non-blood members of the Shimada-gumi know anything beyond rumors. Only those in our family are certain they exist. This means that our enemies will have no defense against them in case of an attack. Their secrecy protects us.”

“Yes, but why?” Genji insisted. He carefully picked a light blue flower with enough of the stem left to put it in Hanzo’s hair. “Yesterday Yuito walked right through Kaba like she wasn’t even there. Are they really invisible to other people when they’re not protecting us?” The flower slid easily into place among the others. They complemented the orange of Hanzo’s _kyudo-gi_.

“When I got my dragons, Father explained to me that only those we love can see them outside of battle,” Hanzo said. “Someone we truly love, not some passing infatuation. You and I and Father are family and all care for each other deeply; the fact that we can see each other’s dragons proves this. I would trust either of you with my life.” Genji wove one last flower into his brother’s hair.

“So I can see your dragons because you love me,” he said, “and you can see mine because I love you, and trust you with my life?”

Hanzo smiled softly. “Yes.” He checked the watch on his wrist and was surprised to see that the time they had allotted for lunch had passed. “Ah, Genji, we must continue training.” He made to stand up, but his legs below his knees seemed to have become frozen to the ground. They prickled with static, the pins and needles he felt when he had sat in one place for too long, but more intense than he had ever experienced. His and Genji’s dragons had disappeared suddenly, leaving only a few bent strands of grass. Genji had fallen silent.

“Genji?” Hanzo frowned. “Is something wrong? I cannot move my legs; they must have fallen asleep.” There was no response. “Genji?” He turned his head, and the scene instantly morphed. He was standing in the dojo; the mural of the two dragons hung over his head to his left, and Genji stood in front of him, sword drawn. His hair fell out of the braid as it grew, turning into long sheets that framed his face. Blue blossoms drifted delicately to the floor around him.

“Hanzo, you don’t have to do this,” Genji said. His face was contorted in rage, colored with a hint of fear. “Just let me go. The elders have nothing to worry about; I will not reveal their secrets to anyone. I just want out.” _Do this?_ Hanzo looked down at the sudden weight in his hand, his eyes widening as he realized that he, too, was holding a sword. A surge of panic coursed through him, causing a scream to bubble in his throat, but his body moved on autopilot, reciting these movements like he had practiced them. He glared at his brother.

“You are a Shimada,” he said coldly. “You are one of us, and you cannot escape that.” His foot slid back into a stronger stance. The anger in Genji’s eyes flared up; in his head, Hanzo begged him to stop, to not goad him on.

“Did the elders tell you that? Once a Shimada, always a Shimada?” he said, shaking his head. “If you believe that you or they can control me, you are mistaken. I am not a _puppet_ like you.” He spat the word out like it was leaving a foul taste in his mouth.

“A puppet?” Hanzo said. “No. I do what I must because it is my duty, but I am no puppet.” Bright blue electricity crackled on the surface of his skin and wrapped itself around the hilt of his blade. “I am no longer going to cover for you or pick up your slack, brother. You have used the clan's money and returned nothing - and now, after our father has passed, you still evade your duty, even going so far as to attempt to flee. You have been nothing but a burden on this clan and disrespect our father's legacy. If you are not going to be part of this clan - this _family_ \- you must be disposed of.” Genji’s eyes widened and he took a step back. His grip on his sword loosened.

“You don’t mean that, Hanzo,” he said, doubt creeping into his voice. “You may be under the thrall of the elders, but not so far as to do something like that.” Hanzo’s shoulders were hunched, his stance like steel, but all he wanted now was for Genji to run and get away from him, _please, before it is too late-_

“I told you,” he stated coldly. “I do what I must. Besides, if you cannot stand against me, what hope do you have against the enemies of the Shimadas that will come after you once you leave?” Genji didn’t even have time to pull his sword back into a proper position before Hanzo was on him. Hanzo’s swing missed by an inch, but he quickly shifted momentum to bring it back around and make another strike forward. Genji blocked it and pushed his brother off.

“Hanzo, please!” he yelled. He fought defensively to Hanzo’s tight offense, but Hanzo had always been a better swordsman. He could see that parts of Genji’s clothing were becoming bloodied as he found the chinks in his brother’s defense to nick him. Genji’s strength soon began to wane, and his defense wore thin. Finally, a forceful strike managed to knock his sword out of his hand and push him back a few steps. Hanzo raised his sword as Genji’s hands came up in front of him, like they could protect him from the coming blow. Bright tears trailed from Genji’s eyes, shining by the light of the lanterns around them. Hanzo looked at the polished blade, and for a second he could see his brother’s terrified face reflected in it.

“Brother,” Genji said weakly. For a brief second, there was a flicker of green, and Genji’s snakelike dragon perched on his right shoulder, her eyes boring into Hanzo’s. Hanzo’s sword came down and slashed through the apparition before continuing its journey across Genji’s body to his left hip. The dragon dissipated into green wisps of smoke that floated upward and out of Hanzo’s sight. Hanzo brought his sword down again, burying it in his brother’s stomach. He pulled it free, blood splattering up and streaking across his face as he stood panting above his brother’s body. All at once, all the adrenaline seemed to leave his body, and he collapsed to his knees, soaking his clothing in the pool of blood beneath him. The longer he sat there, the more he realized what had just occurred. He stared down in horror at his brother's body.

“Genji?” He leaned forward. A cautious hand reached towards the wound, which was still bubbling with blood. “Genji, please.” His voice was a whimper, and his hand made contact with Genji’s flesh, still so warm, some of the red already becoming tacky on his skin even as more spilled from the wound. “No, no, no, Genji, please,” he said, his other hand pressing on the wound, trying to staunch the flow of blood, but it was useless, there was so much, he couldn’t _breathe-_ “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please.” He fumbled for Genji’s wrist, checking for a pulse. Nothing. He clasped his hands - now shaking - over his mouth, smearing the blood already on his face. The metallic smell filled the air and made him choke, and suddenly he was leaning to the side, vomiting on the ground next to him. It didn’t take him long to vacate the contents of his stomach, but he kept wretching and realized he was choking out sobs.

He closed his eyes, and when he opened them, he saw both of his dragons atop Genji’s body. Their eyes met his, and he could feel the sorrow they felt through his bond with them. They nosed at the side of Genji’s face and looked back at him.

“Please,” Hanzo croaked out, reaching for them. As soon as his hand touched one, they both dissipated into blue smoke. The tendrils spiraled up and out of view, leaving Hanzo alone with Genji’s body.

 

\--

 

Hanzo jerked awake with a loud gasp. Dull pain pounded a staccato rhythm out behind his eyes as he sat up on the tattered cot. The scratchy blanket had been pushed to the side in his sleep, and the cot itself had become sweat-damp. He grimaced in distaste and grabbed his toiletries from the bag next to the cot and stood up, crossing the room to enter the dimly lit bathroom.

The sink water ran an unfortunate red when he turned the handle, and for a second he was back in the nightmare, blood pooling at his feet, staining his clothes, Genji’s clothes, so red, the smell metallic and cloying - the water began to run clear and cool, and the vision melted away.

He cupped his hands under the stream, letting the water gather before splashing it on his face to wash away the remnants of sleep and nightmare. When he finished wiping the water clear of his eyes, he braced himself on the sink and forced himself to look at his reflection in the grimy mirror. A haggard-looking man with a slightly overgrown beard and empty eyes stared back. He ran a finger along the edges of his facial hair and reached into the bag to pull out a straight razor. It gleamed brightly in the light as he cut back the overgrowth and shaped the sides. There was something soothing in the methodical action, one of the few luxuries he allowed himself. He finished, cleaned the razor off, and turned to the shower.

The water felt like shards of ice as it made contact with his skin, causing a shiver to roll down his spine and making his fists clench. He wasn’t surprised by the temperature. Why would he expect warm water in this dingy Spanish motel? He had chosen it because of its price and proximity to Gibraltar. He had no desire to be actually on Gibraltar, not yet. There was a chance he could have run into Genji in town, and he wanted to see his brother again on his own terms, not by chance encounter.

As he worked the shampoo into his hair, he thought of Genji. His brother, now encased in metal like an omnic, an unknown portion of him still human and organic. _My fault._ The thought came unbidden, and Hanzo had to pause his ministrations to close his eyes and breathe. _He may have accepted what he is, but how can I forgive myself for being the cause?_ The answer, in his eyes, was simple; he couldn’t. But when Genji contacted him again and offered him a chance to reconnect, Hanzo couldn’t find it within himself to say no. Now he, a mercenary and ex-yakuza boss, was going to join a fledgling hero organization. If anyone had told him even two months ago he would be joining Overwatch at the whim of his dead brother, he would have laughed in their face. Reality was a funny thing.

He finished showering, dried off, and exited back into the main room with his toiletries. His sleepwear was deposited unceremoniously in his bag, and he pulled a fresh kyudo-gi from it. In any other circumstance, he might have just worn the one from the previous day, but he felt it best he made a good first impression on the watchpoint’s inhabitants. He quietly hoped that there were washing machines at the watchpoint. Oftentimes it was difficult to find a laundromat, let alone one he felt he could escape quickly if the need arose. They were always so brightly lit and open to public view. It was unnerving, and he often found himself stretching his clothes out as long as possible before it became too unhygienic to not clean. He had hand-washed his clothes before, but preferred the simplicity of the machines. He had always taken the servants for granted in Hanamura.

He cut the internal tangent short and refocused on the current task with a scowl. It would do him no good to let nerves distract him. Distraction meant vulnerability. He reached under the bed and pulled out the instrument case he used to disguise Storm Bow, strapping it to his back. His other bag he hoisted over his shoulder, and he stepped up to the door to leave. It was time.

 

\--

 

The bus ride into Gibraltar itself was about an hour, but the scenery was interesting and the bus quiet enough for Hanzo to not feel too bored. He had become accustomed to those long rides, anyways, having traveled the world twice over in search for penitence. Still, he gazed out the window, his bag and bow in the adjacent seat protecting him from well-meaning traveling companions, and prepared himself. Obviously Genji knew what he had done, but who else of the recalled members would? Was Genji’s story common knowledge among the other agents? Hanzo thought it best he prepare for the worst and accept that they most likely hated him. He didn’t blame them, but that line of thinking was irrelevant. He wasn’t there for them. He was there for Genji. That was all. To his left, the Mediterranean stretched out to the horizon, glimmering in the morning sun.

Once he was deposited in Gibraltar, Hanzo found that actually making his way to the watchpoint was far more difficult than his bus ride. It took over an hour of searching to find the road that led into the base itself. It likely hadn’t been easy to find in Overwatch’s prime; a few well-placed trees and scrub bushes kept it tucked out of sight, but in the five years since the organization’s collapse, the foliage had gone unmonitored and done its best to hide all evidence of the road’s existence. It was a perfect place for fugitives to get back on their feet. Traversing that road on foot took another hour, considering he stayed away from the main road itself to avoid any cameras still operational.  The predominant scrubland made that difficult; trees were few and far between, and the bushes often barely went up to his waist.

His original intention was to scope out the base before he actually entered, but when he finally reached the main entrance, he found it completely exposed in the craggy face of the cliff, with nothing between him and the doors. There was a nondescript truck parked out front loaded with boxes that people were taking into the base. They chattered among themselves as they did, voices cheery. He couldn’t quite pick up what they said, but he picked out a variety of accents. _The new Overwatch, then,_ he thought. _An eclectic bunch, to be sure._ He tried to sink back into the foliage and out of sight, but an ill-placed twig beneath his foot made a sharp _snap!_ ring out through the air. Immediately, five heads swiveled towards him and five hands reached towards weapons.

“Oi, you’re not supposed to be up here!” The short, brown-haired woman with a British accent was the first to speak. Hanzo took a deep breath and made to take a step forward, but as he moved, there was a flash of blue and suddenly she was right in front of him, both guns drawn and pointed at his chest. “I don’t want to shoot you, but you should probably stop moving, love.” He tensed up at her sudden appearance and blinked a few times to make sure what he was seeing was real. She had been almost all the way across the clearing less than a second ago, and now she was less than five feet away. It was impossible. He was stunned into silence. It stretched out for a long moment, all eyes on him, before the main doors creaked open again and his brother came out, followed by… _a gorilla?_ _What_ is _Overwatch?_

Genji noticed him immediately. “Brother! I am glad you managed to find the base,” he said. Hanzo had thought the feeling in the clearing had been tense before, but now he could cut through the tension with a knife. All but one of them, a young woman who appeared Korean, began to glare at him intensely, but they pulled their hands away from their sidearms.

“This is your brother?” Hanzo identified the speaker as the one he instantly labeled “cowboy.” The drawling southern American accent matched his getup. With his hat, boots, belt buckle, and blanket, he looked like something straight out of a western. “The one that-”

“Jesse,” Genji said warningly, his head turning towards the man. This “Jesse” frowned at Genji and hitched his thumbs into his belt. Sunlight glinted off the prosthetic that extended from his left elbow; Hanzo absently noted the skull emblazoned on the back.

“I ain’t gonna sugarcoat or ignore it, Genji,” he said. He gestured towards Hanzo. “This so-called ‘brother’ of yours damn near killed you.” The Korean woman’s eyes widened and she looked between Hanzo and Genji. Hanzo looked away, not wanting to meet her eyes.

“I am aware,” Genji said. “As I have told you, however, I have forgiven him. I expect you to give him a proper greeting.” He looked at the rest of the group. Somehow, despite the visor covering his face, the gaze was piercing. “I expect that from all of you. He has come a long way to repair our relationship, and he deserves a second chance.” They all looked at one another silently before the British woman holstered her pistols with a spin and held a hand out to Hanzo.

“The name’s Lena Oxton,” she said. “Call sign Tracer.” He shook it slowly.

“Hanzo Shimada,” he said, suddenly aware of how rough his voice was from disuse. “It is… nice to meet you.”

“Can’t quite say I feel the same, but if Genji is going to vouch for you, I won’t object,” she said flatly. Hanzo nodded in acceptance. She pulled her hand away and with a flash of blue was on the other side of the clearing. She picked up the box she had been carrying before Hanzo arrived and was inside the base with another streak of light. Hanzo blinked in confusion. Genji saw the expression on his face and laughed.

“She does that,” he said. “You will get used to it.” He stepped up to his brother and reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, but dropped it when he saw Hanzo subtly flinch. Genji made no comment on it, something which Hanzo was grateful for. It was hard enough seeing his brother in this state; the thought of those metal fingers resting on his skin was almost too much to bear. Genji guided him over to the group, and Hanzo found himself faced with a whirlwind of introductions; the large German man who had seemed so boisterous before his arrival, the Korean woman who was evidently a video game streamer, the blonde woman who Genji introduced as a doctor, and, of course, the literal gorilla. Dr. Ziegler’s introduction had been tense. If Hanzo had to guess, he would have said that she had been the one to treat Genji when he first arrived, so she knew every detail. He swallowed dryly.

The cowboy’s introduction was rough as well. “Name’s Jesse McCree,” he said. His hat cast a shadow over his eyes, but the angry glint was still easily visible. “You can call me McCree.” There was an unspoken “Don’t call me Jesse” that Hanzo acknowledged with a nod. He could see the protective hunch to McCree’s shoulders. This man had obviously been a friend to Genji, before, and likely knew more details than any of the other agents besides the doctor. The others hadn’t been quite restrained with their opinions of Hanzo, but the cowboy would undoubtedly be quite outspoken. Hanzo accepted this; it wasn’t undeserved.

“Hanzo,” he said simply.  While the others had offered a hand to shake, both of Jesse’s stayed where they were, his flesh hand dangerously close to his holster still. A warning, then. Hanzo made no move to shake his hand either.

“Jesse, please-” Genji started, but Hanzo cut him off.

“You do not need to tell him to treat me well, brother,” he said. “I do not blame him for his feelings about me. I can take his anger.” Genji seemed like he wanted to say something comforting, and even reach for him, but he stopped himself.

“Well, Hanzo, I will show you to your quarters,” he said. Hanzo nodded, and with a turn of the heel, followed his brother into the base. He could feel the cowboy’s eyes on him all the way to the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hanzo attempts to get settled in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First: Warning for intense depictions of gore. It gets a bit gnarly this chapter. Starting at "I don't care" and going until "Hanzo didn’t know how to respond" for all of that, from then on you should be fine. I'll give a brief summary in the end notes of what's happening in that zone for anyone who needs to skip, because it is a kind of important bit.
> 
> Second: hello yes I am back! Like I said, two weeks this first time, but hopefully every Saturday from this point on. Last Friday was my birthday (I'm 19 now so like... that actually means nothing in the US tbh) and I was away for most of the week celebrating with friends :D I didn't get much work done until I got back on Sunday haha. I did actually plan to have this chapter go a tiny bit farther, chronologically, and I even wrote that bit, but the chapter went on for nearly 2k words longer than the previous chapter and it made the pacing a bit harder so I cut it back 1.5k words, which are gonna be in the next chapter! So that's pretty sweet, I guess, having just under half of the next chapter written if I get the rest of it right.  
> Guys, I am so humbled by the like... immediate response I got on this. Idk if any of you peered through my other works but the amount of kudos, comments, and hits in the time since I've posted it far surpasses the rate of growth on anything else I have. My oldest work has only 300 more hits and half the kudos, and I've only posted the first chapter of this. I'm so grateful. I will keep trying to do my best to bring you something fantastic.
> 
> SPEAKING OF FANTASTIC... thank you to my beta, [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/), for being her awesome goddamn self and editing my shit. I am 100% serious when I say that a lot of this would be hot garbage if she didn't help me and give me ideas. In short, thank you Abby for my life. Thanks again to [Cin](http://oyabu.tumblr.com/) for giving the chapter a final readthrough to pick out the tiny things missed and help me gauge if I got that tone I was looking for down.  
> I'd also like to thank Mother Mother and Beyoncé for getting me through the writing and editing on this. Just a hint: "Ghosting" and "Arms Tonite" by Mother Mother are good Hanzo and Genji songs respectively. I guess "Burning Pile" can be kind of a Hanzo song? Idk, I love them all and basically had them on repeat while writing. I just straight up listened to the entire Lemonade album while editing lmao.
> 
> Anyways, as always, hit me up on tumblr at [praesaepe](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/). My askbox is always open. Comments and kudos are super appreciated!!!

The amount of relief that washed over Hanzo when Genji told him that McCree and Lena would be leaving on a mission the next day was embarrassing. It might have been selfish of him, but he didn’t want to deal with the cowboy as he settled in. Not that his reception would be much warmer, considering the reactions of the others outside. The doctor’s cold stare had burned itself into his mind.

“I can give you a tour of the watchpoint later if you wish,” Genji said. They stood outside the room Winston had designated for Hanzo. “Here.” He stepped up to the keypad next to the door. “Right now it isn’t set up, but you can set your handprint and personal code however you wish, see?” He pointed at the list of security settings beside the pad.

“Thank you,” Hanzo said. He shifted uncomfortably, unsure of what to say, his eyes drifting to the side before snapping back to Genji. “I appreciate your assistance. A tour would be nice. Genji.” He tacked on the name like an afterthought. The green slit of Genji’s faceplate met his gaze. Hanzo let out an awkward cough and looked away. The ceiling and walls were the same shade of gray. Probably made of the same material. “Yes.”

Genji nodded slowly. “Yes,” he repeated. He drummed his fingers against the wall next to the pad, the sound painfully metallic. Hanzo fought back a grimace. “Ok. I will be back in half an hour, if you think that is sufficient.”

“That will be fine,” Hanzo said. His eyes met Genji’s visor and they stood there in silence before Hanzo pulled his bag’s strap higher on his shoulder and looked away. “I should probably - “ He gestured vaguely at the door. Genji bobbed his head up and down and took a step back.

“Yes, yes, I will see you in half an hour, then.” Hanzo stood in front of the door and paused. Genji remained where he stood, hands clasped in front of him. Hanzo half turned his head in Genji’s direction, which seemed to startle him. “Oh, sorry, yeah!” He turned and walked away down the hall. When he finally turned the corner, Hanzo let out a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding and his shoulders drooped. He put a hand to the keypad to program the security protocols on his door.

“If you require assistance for anything, I am here, Shimada-san.” Hanzo’s posture tightened again and he bit back a yelp at the voice that came from nowhere. The sudden start had made him enter the code incorrectly, adding in an unwanted 9. He sighed in frustration as he began the process over again. “I apologize for frightening you; I probably should not have introduced myself like that,” the voice said as he punched in a code. “I am Athena, an artificial intelligence that monitors the base. It is a pleasure to make the acquaintance of Agent Genji’s brother.”

“A pleasure?” Hanzo snorted. “You are certainly the first one to say that.”  _ She is likely programmed to be kind to the inhabitants,  _ he thought.

“Genji has been anxiously awaiting your arrival. Despite your difficult past, I feel it would be cruel of me not to allow you a chance to make your own impressions on me,” she said. Hanzo raised an eyebrow. “I admit I’m not sure how I feel about the situation - I am aware of what you did, Shimada-san. I have access to the files of every agent of Overwatch, both new and old.” Hanzo closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening them again. He finished programming the keypad and entered his quarters, the voice following him inside. “But I am an artificial intelligence. Many humans think I am incapable of truly forming my own opinions and personality. Anything I say is a result of my programming. In a way, they are correct. Everything I say, or do, or feel, is at some level caused by my programming. But is that not the same way with humans?” Hanzo set his bag down on the bed and looked vaguely upward, unsure how to acknowledge the AI’s words when she had no face to look at. “I am aware of some of the details regarding how you were raised, Shimada-san, as well as how the elders of the Shimada Clan treated you.” Hanzo clenched his jaw and curled his hands into fists. “Your childhood, your upbringing? That was your ‘programming.’ If I may... the fact that you are here now tells me how you’ve changed. You’ve broken some of that programming. This is your second chance. Don’t be afraid to take it.” 

“I -” Hanzo wasn’t sure how to react. “Thank you,” he settled on. “For your kindness.”

“No problem. It’s the least I can do,” Athena said. “I’ll leave you be for now. There is no video recording in crew quarters, and the audio monitoring is only activated when you call for me directly. Like I said before, if you require assistance, just call for me, Shimada-san.”

“Hanzo.” The words surprised him, but he kept going. “Please.”

“Very well, Hanzo,” she said. If he didn’t know better, he would have said she was smiling as she said it. “Have a good evening. I suggest you join the communal dinner this evening, but it is perfectly reasonable if you did not go.”

“Maybe some other time,” Hanzo said. “I will likely retire to my room after Genji shows me around the watchpoint.” He paused. “Have a good evening as well, Athena.” She fell silent, leaving Hanzo to his thoughts. The interaction left him feeling strangely warm. He hadn’t expected compassion from anyone, let alone an AI. She was oddly perceptive, more than he would have guessed, and had made an unexpected judgement - or lack thereof - on his character. He would have to keep an eye on her.

He took the opportunity now to examine his quarters. It wasn’t a large room, but the space was well utilized and he didn’t feel cramped. The private bathroom to the right made him sigh in relief; he had been worried about communal showers ever since he accepted Genji’s offer.  The desk was a nice touch as well. As he surveyed the room, he tried to get used to the idea that he would be living here for an extended amount of time. He hadn’t had any sort of home since he had fled from Hanamura; it had always been traveling from place to place, going where his marks were, and staying in less than luxurious accommodations. This place, now, was his, in a manner of speaking.

Unpacking was a short endeavor. Hanzo’s profession didn’t permit him many possessions that couldn’t fit on his back. His clothing didn’t fit a full drawer in the dresser, and his walls and desk remained void of any sort of decoration. Storm Bow went under the bed. The process took less than fifteen minutes. When there was nothing more to do, he sat on the bed, feeling useless, waiting for Genji to show back up. He fidgeted with the starched blanket underneath his fingers, then reached for his bag - still holding a few supplies he could use to pass the time - but he thought better of it and withdrew his hand.

The eventual knock was a bittersweet relief. He opened the door and found Genji standing outside.

“Ready?” Even with the robotic filter over his words, Hanzo recognized Genji’s enthusiastic tone. He had always had that tone when he was about to drag Hanzo into certain trouble. If Genji’s invitation to join Overwatch had been verbal instead of the text message he had received, it would have come in this exact tone. It had also been the tone he had been unable to refuse; not even ten years apart could change that.

“Yes,” Hanzo said, holding back a sigh. “Lead the way, Genji.” He fell in step alongside his brother as Genji began to chatter about life at the Watchpoint. He lost track of what Genji was saying as he talked, trying to hear the voice he remembered. It was so familiar. It made his heart ache.

“... and I think that’s about it for crew quarters,” Genji finished as they reached the end of the hall. “Do you have any questions so far?” 

Hanzo blinked. “Ah, no,” he said. 

Genji tilted his head.“Were you actually listening, brother?” he asked.

“Not… very well, I admit,” Hanzo said, trying not to look sheepish. “I apologize. You do not need to re-explain it, I can try to find it out on my own. I will pay more attention going forward.” Genji was silent for a moment before he made a small, peculiar sound Hanzo couldn’t quite decipher. Then he made a louder one, and he kept going, and Hanzo realized he had been  _ giggling _ and it had transformed into an outright laugh. He turned red and waited for Genji to calm down.

“I am not some sort of tutor, Hanzo. You do not need to be so formal with me,” Genji finally managed to say. Hanzo looked away. “I am serious, Hanzo. You are as stiff as a board.”

“I am sorry,” Hanzo said. “I… haven’t settled down in a long time. Of course you’re not a tutor. We should continue, then?” On one hand, he wished he could see Genji’s face. The visor itself was unreadable to him, and enough of Genji’s body language was foreign to him that Hanzo couldn’t extrapolate from it what Genji was feeling. Right now, if he had to guess, he would say Genji was rolling his eyes. On the other hand, well. There were obvious reasons why Hanzo would be put off by the sight of Genji’s face.  _ Maybe the visor is for the best, _ Hanzo thought. He fought back a frown.  _ What a selfish thought. _

“I will show you to rec room A first, then,” Genji said. “After that, the cafeteria and kitchen. Back before the old Overwatch shut down, there were usually chefs that prepared food for everyone. Now, with so few agents at the watchpoint, we just take turns cooking dinner. It is easy to make enough for everyone.” Hanzo nodded. A thought struck him, and he hesitated before asking.

“Do you still… eat?” he said, his shoulders hunching unconsciously.

“Yes,” Genji’s tone was intentionally conversational. “My sense of taste is reduced, though. My lower jaw is prosthetic, as is most of my tongue. My nose is not, and most of taste comes from smell anyways, so that helped Angela’s prosthetics be more effective.” Hanzo noted that Genji’s talking gestures seemed over-dramaticized, making up some for his lack of facial expression. Still, Genji’s motions to his mouth and lower jaw made Hanzo swallow down discomfort. Genji stopped mid-wave.

“Here we are, rec room A!” He gestured to the open doorframe to his right. “Right around the corner from the main crew quarters.” Hanzo peered inside. The TV was off and the couches and table vacant, but there was a short, chubby, dark-haired woman in the kitchenette to his right. Hanzo pulled back just as Genji peered in, hoping to avoid conversation. “Oh, Mei!” Hanzo winced. “Finally out of the lab?” The woman laughed and looked over her shoulder.

“Just taking a short break, Genji,” she said. Hanzo was surprised to hear her reply in Japanese. “I’m getting tea before I head back. Is there someone with you?” Genji stepped into the room and Hanzo followed him to the kitchenette counter.

“Mei, this is my brother, Hanzo,” Genji said. Hanzo waited for her expression to grow cold, but she kept smiling. “Hanzo, this is Mei-Ling Zhou. She is a climatologist who came back recently from an Antarctic expedition.” Mei put her thermos down and held out a hand.

“Nice to meet you, Hanzo,” she said. “Genji has been excited about your arrival.” Hanzo gave it a firm shake.

“Thank you,” he said. “It is nice to meet you as well.” He let go and she grabbed her thermos.

“I really do have to go, sorry!” she said. “If you ever want to chat, you can come down to my lab. You’ll show him where it is, Genji?”

“Yes. You go. I will see you at dinner,” Genji said. Mei retreated through the doorframe they had entered and Hanzo looked at Genji.

“She was very nice,” he said, the implication obvious.

“Do not assume everyone is out to get you, brother,” Genji said simply. “Cafeteria, then?” Hanzo nodded. He gave one last glance at the kitchenette before they walked out the door, figuring he would be making much use of it in order to avoid awkward dinners.

The cafeteria was empty, everyone having already grabbed a quick lunch in between tasks or waiting until dinner to eat, which was still several hours away. Thinking of dinner made Hanzo’s stomach growl. Last night’s meal seemed ages ago, even though he had become accustomed to stretches of hunger.

“Hungry, brother?” Genji asked, voice tinged with amusement.

“I can eat once the tour has been finished,” Hanzo replied, He folded his hands behind him. “I would like to know my way around the watchpoint first, admittedly.”

“Okay. After, then,” Genji said. “You can make use of the kitchenette.”

The rest of the tour was just as awkward for Hanzo. They didn’t run into many people, but those they did run into had a very chilly attitude, only slightly mollified by Genji’s hard stare. The encounters often did not last long, Genji dragging Hanzo away to show him another part of the base. After the better part of an hour, they circled back around to Hanzo’s room.

“Thank you for showing me around,” Hanzo said. “It’s better that I do not stumble around trying to find where I need to be.”

“No problem, brother. Winston wouldn’t want you trying to find the hangar bay and ending up half an hour past the dropship lift-off.”

“That would not be ideal,” Hanzo admitted. “Do you know when Winston will clear me for missions?” The fact that it was a gorilla leading Overwatch and clearing him for field duty still boggled the mind. He remembered the stories about Horizon, but to see an actual product of it was, well, highly unexpected. He made an effort to take it in stride, but every now and then he had to pause and think about it. A  _ gorilla. _

“Probably very soon,” Genji replied. “We are obviously low on agents and it would be beneficial to get as many as we can out in the field.” He stood there. Hanzo wasn’t sure what he was waiting for. He folded his hands behind his back, his back stiff and straight. “You said you were hungry, earlier.”

“Ah, yes,” Hanzo said. “I did. I will probably-”

“We could make something together. Like before.” 

Silence cut between them. Hanzo’s stomach churned with some unnameable emotion. “If you want to.” Genji’s words shattered the ice that had seemed to encase Hanzo, and he blinked.

“I am-” he paused. “I am not that hungry right now. I will eat later.” Genji’s shoulders drooped, and Hanzo felt a pang of sadness. “I am sorry.”

“I understand. Will you be joining us for dinner?” Hanzo could tell from Genji’s tone he didn’t have much hope.

“No, I wish to settle in more, if you do not mind,” Hanzo lied. “Is the fridge in the kitchen communal? I do not want to step on anyone’s toes and eat their food.”

“The kitchen, yes. The kitchenette, no. For now, you can take anything you want from the section in the refrigerator or cabinets with my name on it,” Genji paused. “I actually found some of the matcha pocky you used to like at the international market,” he admitted. “I bought them in preparation for your visit.” Hanzo managed a strained smile.

“I appreciate it,” he said. “I will see you tomorrow?” It came out half as a statement, half as a question. He clenched his fists behind his back. This conversation wasn’t going well.

“Yes. I will send you a message,” Genji said. “On your cell.” Hanzo nodded.

“Good evening, Genji,” he said, taking a step back and turning around to face his door

“Good evening, Hanzo,” Genji said, his voice quieter. Hanzo hunched his shoulders as he finished punching in the code and stepped through the door. As soon as it closed behind him, he slid down, leaned against it, and put his face in his hands.

 

\--

 

Each day, each hour, each moment he spent with Genji was difficult. He wanted desperately to be able to get through one conversation with his brother without that feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach, without that aftertaste of guilt and sorrow and pain. The day after he arrived, Genji saw McCree off on his solo mission to investigate another watchpoint and met up with Hanzo in the rec room. They sat together at the table, facing each other silently, until Genji suggested cards in a cheery tone that was agonizingly forced. Hanzo hastily agreed and they found themselves playing  _ Go Fish, _ of all things. They played ten rounds before stopping, Genji winning the majority. They ate their lunch together, Genji talking while Hanzo listened, before parting ways. Hanzo avoided looking at Genji’s scarred face. If Genji noticed, he didn’t comment. Hanzo spent the afternoon in his room, sharpening his arrows and performing maintenance on Storm Bow. Genji invited him to dinner, but Hanzo turned him down again.

The next day Genji didn’t message him until the afternoon. He invited him to watch a movie - Hanzo agreed. When he got to the rec room and saw the movie Genji had chosen, he wrestled down the urge to smile. 

“ _ The Princess Bride _ ?” he said. “You still like this?”

Genji looked at him over the back of the couch and tilted his head. “Of course! Who doesn’t, Hanzo? It’s a classic,” Genji said, a smile in his voice. Hanzo settled on the other end of the couch as Genji pressed play. Genji was fixated on the dire tale of Princess Buttercup, a scene Hanzo found all at once familiar and excruciating, but Hanzo himself spent the entire movie hyper-aware of his brother. Every so often, he caught a glint of light off of the armor on his body. The film flew by without Hanzo absorbing a single frame. The moment the credits faded onto the screen, he gave Genji a strained smile and left as quickly as he could manage. Dinner was avoided for another night.

The cycle continued the next few days. He would go to wherever Genji had decided they should be, do whatever his brother asked, then retreat for the rest of the day. He avoided everyone else at the watchpoint and fixed himself meals at times no one should be around. No one engaged with him, instead acting like he didn’t exist. The scientist, Mei, was always in her lab - and he wouldn’t dare disturb her, despite her invitation.

It was probably for the best. He told himself that every time he was ignored, every time he passed the labs and didn’t stop, every time he looked at Genji and saw the robotic shell, not the shock of green hair and mischievous smile. He tried to not be obvious about how he felt, but Genji was more perceptive now than he had been when they were young, and he had been very perceptive back then. Still. It was probably for the best they stayed away. He had a tendency to hurt things close to him.

At the end of the first week, he ignored Genji’s invitation message and headed to the practice room with Storm Bow. If there was one room he didn’t want to be in the same time as Genji, it was there. He would answer afterwards; Genji would likely not mind the slight delay as long as he did answer within a reasonable time frame. He pulled Storm Bow from his case and checked the points on his arrows. Athena pulled up a few targets at distance.

The pull on the string, the pause in breath to focus his target, the release, the  _ thwack _ as the arrow point dug into the bullseye: they were all a sort of meditation of their own. He lost himself in the training. After he collected each round of arrows, Athena set up a more difficult course, and he kept finding his marks. Not all of them were perfect shots, but his accuracy was adequate. By the time he finished, he was panting with exertion. He checked the time. It had been less than an hour, and Genji had sent a couple more messages. He decided to answer them when he reached his room, packed up Storm Bow, and left the room just in time to run directly into Dr. Ziegler.

“I apologize,” he said. She looked at him, her eyes narrowed. Hanzo stood in place as she stared him down. “It was unintentional. I did not mean to-”

“I don’t care,” she said. Hanzo was shocked into silence. Dr. Ziegler opened her mouth to speak before snapping it closed again, her gaze steely. Hanzo saw her jaw work for a moment before she finally spoke. “Don’t think I don’t have my eye on you,” she said evenly. “You may already know, but I was the one who took care of your brother after you were done with him.” The venom in her tone sent a chill down Hanzo’s back. “Genji may have forgiven you, but I still remember all too clearly how he looked, clinging to life on my table. I remember the constant blood transfusions and bandage changes while working desperately to create a new body for him before he could die. I remember my nurses having to help me carefully pull away the remnants of his  _ entire lower body _ so that we could attach a new one. Do you know what we had to replace?” Hanzo attempted to swallow down the bile rising in his throat. “A lung, an arm, his entire digestive system. His heart is a mix of the original muscle and artificial enhancements; not that it pumps blood very many places due to all his lower half being mechanical.You managed to catch his jaw in your swing, so we had to replace that. It was hanging on by a thread when he arrived, and we couldn’t save it, no matter how hard we tried. And don’t think I didn’t notice the extra stab wound in his stomach, the one you created after you effectively bisected him. That was a through-and-through, a wound with strength and intent, even after you had made the killing blow.” 

Fire raged in her eyes and she took another step towards him. He stepped back, cowed by her gaze, feeling his stomach roil. “More than that, after I pieced him back together like some sort of macabre Picasso, I had to see a man that was emotionally, mentally, and physically in pain - and even after the physical pain faded away, he was tortured by his situation every minute of every day. The only thing that kept him alive was me and my work, and he  _ hated  _ me for it.” Her eyes filled with tears.

Hanzo didn’t know how to respond. “Please, Dr. Ziegler -” 

“I am looking for a reason to trust you, Hanzo,” she said, cutting him off. “I am looking for a reason you deserve to be here, but I have yet to find anything. It will take a lot to prove me wrong.” She turned with that final sentence and stalked away. He could see her reaching up to furiously wipe the tears from her eyes as she left, and then she was gone around the corner, leaving Hanzo alone in the empty hallway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Angela confronts Hanzo and tells him she's keeping an eye on him. She says that while Genji may have forgiven him, she still thinks of how it was when he first arrived. She gives some descriptions of the medical procedures she had to do to save his life and how mentally and emotionally distraught he was after.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3 is HERE! I definitely put working on this one off, oops. I'm also being slightly rushed as a post it because I'm going to go eat a bunch of junk food at a local festival. This chapter was a lot harder to get through! Finding the right words and story was super difficult, because I knew how I wanted these characters to interact but getting there was rough. I promise I haven't forgotten this is a mchanzo fic and a noodle dragon fic but building up to that stuff properly is extremely important! Siblings are something that I hold very dear to my heart because I have many siblings, and this whole healing process with Genji and Hanzo is difficult to navigate properly.
> 
> Thanks to [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/) for being my wonderful beta and turning this chapter into something a lot smoother and more relatable and [Cin](http://oyabu.tumblr.com/) for giving my chapter a quick read after. I appreciate you guys so much.
> 
> EDIT: How could I forget!! Doomfist!!! Doomfist!!! Oh my god!! Now admittedly I've been on PTR and I'm not fond of his playstyle but LORE :0 He may get involved in a subplot later because I love him and the subplot I had planned out kinda has to have him for lore reasons.

Hanzo wasn’t sure how he got back to his room. He had vague memories of stumbling through the halls, arms wrapped around his stomach, but it felt like he had suddenly gone from standing in the hall to crouching by his bed, shoving Storm Bow’s case beneath it before making a dash for the bathroom. He had barely managed to pull the toilet seat up before he was heaving into it, the meal he had eaten earlier coming back up on a wave of acid. It burned the back of his throat and sent tears trailing down his cheeks. The pictures the doctor had painted burned themselves into his mind, and every time he thought he was done, another image of Genji’s destroyed body would appear and he would vomit only bile into the water.

 _She is right,_ he thought as his stomach finally began to settle after what had seemed like ages. _I do not belong here. I do not deserve to be here._ He remained over the toilet bowl after he flushed it, bracing his shaking arms on the sides and staring at the few stray strands of hair that had broken free of his ponytail. He didn’t know how long he sat there, staring into the water, but eventually exhaustion - both emotional and physical - took over and he found himself drifting off to sleep where he was on the floor. He couldn’t find the energy to stand up, but he brought the lid down and rested his head on it. Somewhere in the back of his mind there was disgusted protest, but it quieted as he fell into a light sleep.

A knock on the door woke him. It was loud, too loud, not like they had just started knocking, but like they had been knocking for a few minutes with no response. His eyes slid towards the door, then down to the phone he pulled from his pocket. A few hours had passed as he slept, and his screen was flooded with increasingly frantic messages from Genji. He blinked slowly. As he stood up, his muscles protested and his back ached. He could hear his shoulders pop as he stretched before glancing in the mirror. His ponytail was a mess; he took a second to pull it down and put it back up, then cupped his hands under the faucet to get some water to drink and wash the sour taste from his mouth. He stumbled a little bit on his way over to the door and cursed himself for sleeping while kneeling like that; the stumps of his legs had rubbed awkwardly against his prosthetics, leaving them feeling raw. He finally reached the door and opened it. Genji stood on the other side, hand raised to knock again. He put it back down.

“Are you okay, Hanzo?” Genji asked. For a second, all Hanzo could do was stare, his mind juxtaposing the images from earlier with what he saw now. There was so much blood he nearly choked on it, but he shoved down the feeling. “Hanzo?” Genji repeated.

“I forgot to text you and fell asleep after I got back from the range.” The lie easily slid off his tongue. It was partially true, but judging by the tilt of Genji’s head, his brother knew there was more to it.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked again.

“I am fine.” It came out a little sharper than intended. Genji was quiet for a moment.

“Come with me, brother. I want to show you one of my favorite places,” Genji said.

“I am not feeling well.” Another half-truth. Guilt pricked him like razor-sharp claws on his back. He couldn’t stand seeing Genji right now, not with the doctor’s words so fresh in his mind. More selfishness on his part.

“Fresh air could help with that.” Genji knew he was lying, but was playing along. He could feel the shame closing up his throat. Genji just wanted to talk to him, to help him, and he was letting his own feelings get ahead of that. How could he? “You would like it.” Hanzo still felt hesitant, torn between his own feelings and wanting to appease his brother, but then Genji followed it with a soft, “Please,” and his guilt won out. Hanzo sighed and ignored the churning in his stomach.

“Very well,” he said. Genji turned and waited for Hanzo to fall in step beside him, but said nothing. Hanzo followed dutifully as they ascended multiple sets of stairs until they were on the roof. He was surprised as it opened up to a large, overgrown garden. A small path wound around the space that had been recently trimmed. As they followed it, it led to a clearing. Around it were all sorts of grasses and wildflowers, some indigenous, some foreign, but all beautiful. Genji sat cross-legged in the center of the clearing, leaving space for Hanzo to sit behind him. He looked up.

“Before Overwatch fell, this garden was maintained by agents,” he said. “A way to destress between missions. I never planted anything or pulled weeds, but on occasion I would come up here and look at the stars.” Hanzo followed his upward gaze and saw the stars that were indeed beginning to show themselves in the darkening sky. He saw movement next to him and looked over to see Genji staring at him. “Something troubles you, brother. It has been troubling you since you arrived, maybe even before, but something happened today, didn’t it?” Hanzo looked back at the sky, then down and his hands folded in his lap. “You didn’t respond to my messages. I was worried.” Genji’s voice was gentle, like he was attempting to soothe a small child.

Hanzo felt irrational anger stir in his gut and spoke before he could stop himself. “I am not a child. Stop treating me like one,” he snapped. His eyes immediately widened and he clenched his fists in his lap, his fingernails digging into the flesh of his palm and leaving angry red crescent marks. “I am sorry, I did not mean to snap at you like that,” he said.

“It is fine. You are right,” Genji said. “We are not children. Will you please talk to me?” Genji reached out and touched Hanzo’s hands. It took monumental effort not to jerk them away, but he still flinched. “And stop this.” He loosened his grip and flattened his hands so that his and Genji’s palms were touching. They were shaking. “Brother, what happened?”

“Nothing I do not deserve,” Hanzo said gruffly, pulling his hands away and setting them on his lap again.

“Hanzo,” Genji said. “You are blaming yourself.” Hanzo chuckled dryly.

“How can I not?” He looked straight at Genji’s visor. “Genji, this is my fault. All of this. All of you. I pushed you away from the clan, and when you decided you had had enough, I killed you. I _killed_ you, Genji. I killed my brother.”

“You did not push me away, I distanced myself of my own accord. I acted like a spoiled child,” Genji said. “That was never you.” Hanzo looked at his hands again as he rubbed his palms up and down his thighs. “And you know as well as I do that the elders manipulated you just as long. That _Father_ manipulated you. He pressed duty after duty on you, held you accountable, while I did nothing. The elders turned you against me, and they were the ones that ordered you kill me.”

“But I did it, Genji! It was me who held that sword, who cut you apart!” Angry tears filled Hanzo’s eyes and threatened to spill down his cheeks. “No matter what the elders said, I could have stopped it, but I didn’t. I didn’t because I was weak. I killed the one person that truly cared about me. The doctor was right.”

Genji started. “The doctor? What-”

Hanzo stood up quickly, cutting him off. “You have no reason to trust me. I should not be here, among heroes. Nothing good can come of this, Genji.” He turned and walked out of the garden, ignoring Genji as he called his name, not looking back.

 

\--

 

He reached his assigned quarters and locked the door behind him before entering the bathroom and turning the faucet on. He cupped his hands underneath the stream and splashed the clear water on his face. The strength in his legs was lost. He let his face stay in the sink as he leaned over it, braced on his elbows. It took him several minutes hunched above the water to realize the tears he had felt earlier were falling. He did nothing to stop it. Why bother? He turned the faucet off and remained in place for a long while.

When he finally wiped away the last of the tears, he stood up and took stock of his body. Everything seemed to ache, his back especially, and he could hear his stomach growling. Understandable; everything he had eaten today had ended up in the toilet. He didn’t want to leave his room, not now, with this pit in his stomach, but his body demanded that he eat. He grimaced.

He paused at the door of the room, ensuring no one was on the other side, before he exited and made a beeline for the kitchenette. He pulled a few things from the fridge and made a sandwich, still only vaguely aware of his actions. He had turned off the kitchenette light and was about to take it back to his room when a figure came through the the rec room doors: the Korean woman, the gamer. Hanzo stood still in the near-darkness, hoping he wouldn’t be noticed. She headed straight for the cabinets, flicking the light switch as she went, and almost didn’t notice him, but when she did, she stopped. Her headphones rested around her neck, and she looked almost bored, but Hanzo saw the inquisitive glean in her eyes.

“Not gonna lie, you look like shit,” she stated. “Rough day, buddy?” Hanzo opened his mouth to reply, but she spoke again before he could, even while she finished her journey to the cabinets and began rifling around in her section. “Obviously. It’s midnight, and you at least try to eat at somewhat reasonable times. I would know,” she stood on the tips of her toes to reach something in the back of the cabinet, “because I’m the one in here during the _unreasonable_ times.” She emerged from the cabinet with a crinkling bag in her hands, then leaned back on the countertop to face Hanzo with a close-lipped smile. “Tell you what. I’m not streaming tonight, I’m just playing something relaxing. You can come join me. You play anything?”

Hanzo wasn’t sure how to react to her onslaught. “I… yes. I would occasionally indulge my brother. In the past.” The thought of Genji made him cringe, but he pushed the reflex away and held himself straight.

“Good.” She turned back towards the door and wiggled the bag in her hands. “I’ve got Cheetos.” Hanzo wrinkled his nose in distaste, and Hana’s grin grew. “Exactly. That’s what makes them so good. You remember my name, right?”

Hanzo blinked. “Hana, if I am not mistaken?”

“Correct,” she said. “Now, are you joining me, or not?”

Hanzo considered it for a moment before making a decision. He knew he wouldn’t be sleeping, not for a while, and she didn’t seem openly hostile. She also wasn’t Genji.

“I will join you.”

“Awesome. Can you hold this?” She tossed the bag to him and went back the fridge. He caught it without thinking and stared at the packaging. What was he doing? “I’m getting something to drink, you probably should too.” He looked up at her back.

“Can you get me a water from Genji’s section of the fridge?” he asked hesitantly. When she backed out of the door and closed it with her foot, she had two water bottles in her hand.

“I usually stream in my room,” she says. “Come on. Turn the light off behind you.” He did as she said, and the pair exited the rec room in the direction of  crew quarters. She walked predictably loud – military training didn’t generally cover the finer details of stealth. He followed behind her, ghostlike, leaving no sound in his wake. They reached her door. He stared at her back as she opened it.

“I am not sure this is…” he paused, struggling for words.

She cut him off before he could speak again. “You can’t back out now,” she said. “Besides, what are you going to do? Go back to your room and mope? _You_ know you probably shouldn’t, _I_ know you probably shouldn’t, and I’ve always found low stress video games are a good way to calm down and get yourself back to normal.” Hanzo found her obstinance both annoying and ridiculously familiar. _Just like Genji,_ he thought. He shot her a glare. She looked unimpressed, but her gaze seemed to soften as she continued. “Listen, I may not have been around the base as much, but I know how people have been treating you. I’m trying to be nice. I want to hear your side of the story, because I know how annoying younger siblings can be.” She smiled slightly as Hanzo gave her a wary look. They stood like that for a moment before he let his shoulders drop.

“Very well,” he said.

He followed her into her room. It had a similar setup to his own, but her desk had two monitors on it and there was a small couch, coffee table, and TV shoved into the space he had left empty. It was far more cramped in Hanzo’s opinion, but she seemed used to it and made herself comfortable on the couch. She put the water bottles on the table, and Hanzo followed suit with the Cheetos before settling himself as far on the other end of the couch as he could. This entire situation felt awkward to him.

“I found this old platformer called ‘A Story About My Uncle,’” she said as she picked up the controller. The start menu was already up on the screen, awaiting her return from her quick snack run. “I had to dig up a Windows 10 emulator for this one. The OS is just _ancient_ , like, twenty-tens era. Prehistoric. None of my controller drivers worked on systems that far back. I managed to unearth one from a forum post from 2068.” Through her easy technobabble, she tore open her snacks and popped one into her mouth. She held the bag towards Hanzo, who held up a palm to delicately decline. She shrugged and set the bag in between them. She fiddled with the game options as she went on about her technical difficulties; it was obvious she didn’t expect much conversation out of him. Hanzo began to minutely relax.

“Moral of the story is that this game better be good. I went to all that trouble, you know? I heard good things about it, though. It’s supposed to be a pretty short and simple game.”

“I have not heard of it.” He watched as Hana started the game. The screen darkened, and after a moment Hanzo heard dialogue between a man and a girl Hanzo assumed to be his daughter.  The avatar woke up in a dimly lit room and explored it as the father told the girl a story about his childhood. There was only one path through the house that Hana’s character could follow. Hana had progressed to the final room of the house before Hanzo spoke, his tone low and hesitant. “You referred to having a younger sibling earlier.”

“Yep! His name is Jin-ho,” she said, her eyes remaining on the screen. “He is thirteen and extremely obnoxious.” Hanzo felt a smile tug at the corner of his lips. “Sometimes when I’m home he interrupts my stream, takes stuff from my room without asking, and won’t stop bugging me in general. It annoys the hell out of me.” The avatar was taken to some sort of other world filled with floating rocks and glowing symbols. Hanzo watched as they ran and jumped around the map. “I haven’t known Genji long, but I can tell he was probably _very_ annoying growing up, even if he’s a lot more mellow now. But I still can’t quite understand why what happened between you two happened.” Hana wasn’t smiling anymore, but she didn’t look angry, like Hanzo expected. Still, he tensed up. “Even with Jin-ho being as annoying as he is, I love him more than anything. When I’m out there in my MEKA, he and the rest of my family are who I’m thinking of, who I’m protecting.” Hana had her character onscreen land on top of a platform and set the controller on her lap so she could look at Hanzo. He should have expected this. He hunched up slightly, waiting for her to berate him just like Angela did. Just like he deserved.

“You’re here. You’re making an effort. Obviously you care about Genji, but... what happened to make you try to kill him?”

Hanzo clenched his fists and stared at his lap, crushing both the guilty urge to bolt from the room and a flash of anger at her line of questioning. Hana caught his sudden change in demeanor, her eyes widening and her voice softening. “I’m not trying to attack you, Hanzo. I really do want to know. It’s easy to see that there was something else going on-”

“Whatever else was ‘going on’ did not matter,” Hanzo said tightly, cutting her off. “What mattered was what I did. I made the decision, and I killed him.” Hana frowned. Hanzo glanced up and saw the expression. “What? It is true. He died by my hand, or so I thought. Why are you asking me this?” Hana opened up the pause screen and set the controller on the coffee table before shifting to face him cross-legged on the couch.

“I told you, I want to know. You love Genji just as much as I love Jin-ho. But I couldn’t kill my brother.” Hanzo winced. “I mean - you wouldn’t be able to either. So there was some kind of- I don’t know, a tipping point. _Something_ happened, something went sour. We may not be friends, or even know each other at all, but I think it’s wrong to see someone so obviously in pain and not do anything about it, even persecute them more when they’re trying to… make things right.” Hanzo watched her warily. She seemed honest, open, but this was almost too much.

“And you see, I think you’re wrong about that. What you just said, I mean,” she continued. “Context does matter, even for something like this. Especially for something like this. Genji let slip that the Shimada clan was yakuza, and I know that while our cultures place family in high importance, old yakuza can hold family in even higher regard.”

“They do,” Hanzo said. “But maybe not as high as they hold duty.”

Hana’s face was serious, earnest, her attention lasered in on him. “What do you mean?”

Hanzo caught himself speaking before he could think better of it. “My father was the head of the clan, and his father before him. A council of elders from the family were the advisors to the head.” He picked at a stray thread on his gi. “They were the ones who directed me the most following my father’s death. They wanted me to... reel Genji in. He had been disrespectful to the clan since his teenage years and did very little to help in our enterprises, leaving my father and I to shoulder burdens meant to be his. When I failed to do so, they ordered his death.

“I complied. I confronted him in the dojo in our home and killed him.” He clenched his fists again. “He tried to stop me. He told me he just wanted to leave and that he would neither burden nor bother us ever again. I could have let him leave, and he wouldn’t be what he is now, barely human and mostly… other. I did not, though; I let my sense of duty get the best of me and he suffered greatly for it.” He smiled grimly. “The doctor made sure I knew that.” Hana stared at him quietly, taking in his story. Hanzo hoped she understood, that she could tell. When she kept silent, he frowned.

“Do you not get it, Hana?” His voice took on an edge and his brow furrowed. “I killed him in cold blood. It did not stop me killing later, either. The past ten years I have been a mercenary for hire, going where the money takes me. I was the head of a yakuza clan, once. I am not someone you should be sympathetic towards, and I am not someone who should be here.” His voice had shifted into a growl and he stood up. He had said far too much. Panic bubbled up in his stomach, and his brain began to shift into adrenaline-fueled “fight or flight”. He had no idea why he had done that, spilled all of that out to her. He didn’t know her. She didn’t need his burdens. He shifted slightly, prepared to turn and leave the room.

“What, and you think all of that was your idea?” Hana finally spoke, and he froze in place. “They taught you to hate Genji because he didn’t do what they wanted him to do.” She stared him down, not letting him break eye contact. “I don’t know your entire history, Hanzo, but from what you said just now, the fact that you were manipulated was obvious. That doesn’t excuse your actions,” she held up a hand as he opened his mouth to speak, “but it does explain them. Our cultures both teach us to respect our elders and do our duties. Genji not adhering to that was against what you were taught and what they wanted, so they turned you against each other, pressuring you to fight as you grieved for your father. It was the easiest way for them to get what they wanted.” Hana turned back to the TV and picked the controller up again, unpausing the game.

“You do have a lot to make up for, Hanzo,” she said. “But if you ever cared for your brother the way I do mine - and I think you did and I think you do now, even if it’s hard for you - then you shouldn’t let your past determine your future.” The avatar landed at the top of another platform. “If you did, they would still be getting what they wanted, and why would you ever want to let those bastards get what they want?” She grinned, and Hanzo a strange surge of warmth spread through him as she spoke. A chuckle seemed to bubble up in his throat out of nowhere, surprising him. “Sit down. Take a turn at this.” He sat down and she handed him the controller and began to explain the controls. His thumbs were clumsy, but managed to move the character and navigate the game. Hana and Hanzo traded the controller off soon enough, the world around them blessedly blurring out.

When the end came, Hana yawned widely, and Hanzo could feel the heaviness of sleep settling in his limbs. He wished her a good night and retreated to his room.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are guys, chapter four. I've been excited for the stuff in this chapter for quite a while! Like there's a scene in here that I've been imagining since the day I started putting this fic together!!! I really hope you guys like this chapter. It was a good one for me to write. OH! ALSO! If Genji and Hanzo, Hanzo and Mei, or any combination thereof speak to one another alone, assume it's Japanese. I've personally found having marks/italics to indicate speaking of another language a bit intrusive when I read fics, especially when up to this point it's been most of their dialogue. As we get into settings where there's characters that don't speak Japanese (which in my HCs is everyone but Mei, Hanzo, and Genji - I'm honestly still debating on Hana so if you guys want to weigh in on that please do! Alternatively hmu with those HCs that any of the three speak Korean or Mandarin [other than Mei of course lmao]) default that they're speaking English unless I specify otherwise. I might end up using italics/markers in that situation if I find that necessary. We'll see as we go along, I think.
> 
> Shout out to [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/) for being an awesome beta as usual!!! You guys really don't quite know how much better she makes this thing. It's absolutely wild. Another shout out to [cin](http://oyabu.tumblr.com/) for helping me with some other stylistic stuff and helping me gauge the tone :') They're wonderful and also remind me that it's okay to use gerunds in moderation...
> 
> I'm on tumblr at [praesaepe](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/)! My askbox is always open, so send me a message. Also, I have a [tag for my fic](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/tagged/scales-and-vectors) there that has little insights and dumb comments from writing as well as one little ficlet I wrote about Angela's POV in chapter 2! Who knows, maybe I'll start dropping other ficlets if I do writing ask memes or get struck with inspiration (tbh the former is far more likely than the latter).

**10 new messages:**

_Genji: angela told me what she said to you. she shouldnt have done that._

_Genji: hanzo are you okay? do you need time_

_Genji: i can totally respect that if you do, of course_

_Genji: youre still on base right?_

_Genji: i asked athena and she told me you were but dont worry she didnt tell me where you are if you were worried about that_

_Genji: we should talk. nothing is wrong but we should talk._

_Genji: hana just texted me and said you played video games with her. glad to know youre making friends on the base!_

_Genji: ok ill stop texting you, just text me whenever you feel ready i guess_

_Genji: also jesse should be back soon if you were wondering_

 

_Hana: hey thanks for playing that game with me! the ending was really sweet haha. if you want to hang out you can always swing by my room!_

 

**1 Unread Email**

_Hey Hanzo! You still haven’t stopped by my lab! The offer is still open! - Mei_

 

Hanzo sighed and put his phone down. Even after his late night playing games with Hana, he couldn’t face his brother. He still needed time. Time to process how he felt - bad, guilty… hopeful? That one was new - and time to process what Hana had said to him. It was something Genji had said to him several times in the past week, but it felt different coming from her; more objective, more real. He hadn’t realized before how much he had fought the concept, even though he had spent the last ten years coming to terms with his upbringing following Genji’s death. He could feel himself fighting it, even now. What part of the blame was his, and what belonged to his family? _A nearly impossible question,_ he thought. _One I must figure out the answer to myself._

Hana was definitely right in something else, as well: He shouldn’t sit in his room and mope. He had woken up late yesterday, a symptom of his late night and a deviance from the schedule he had been attempting to maintain for years, and had made an early lunch alone in the rec room. For a moment he had considered speaking to Hana again, but that hadn’t felt right. He had needed alone time. On the tour of the base Genji had shown him where to find a few trails that had formerly led to observation decks for tourists, so he had decided to explore those, instead. Many were overgrown like the garden Genji had shown him, but there was peace to be found in seeing how nature had overtaken something manmade.

This morning, Mei’s email sat open when he picked up his phone again, a blatant solution to something that shouldn’t have been a problem. He was still hesitant, though, and he stared apprehensively at the screen, before finally, clicking the reply button.

 

_I could come by this afternoon, if you do not mind. - Hanzo_

 

He pressed send; no turning back now. He put the phone in his pocket, retrieved his bag from the floor next to his desk and stood, hefting it over his shoulder. There was still plenty of time before the afternoon came, if Mei took his offer. It might be a good time for this.

He managed to avoid the other inhabitants of the base as he exited and headed to the trails he’d wandered yesterday. He had found one particular view that he enjoyed, and quickly made his way down the path. It was a long walk, but he found it good for contemplation. The path finally opened up to a crude wooden observation deck on the edge of a cliff that looked out over the Alboran Sea. It was still stable enough to support his weight, and there was a broken railing that he sat at now, letting his legs dangle over the edge. His bag went to his side and from it he pulled out a bound notebook. More digging produced a pencil and a sharpener. He stared at the point before finding it not up to standards, and sharpened it to the fine point he preferred before flipping through several pages of the creamy white paper, passing dozens of colorless sketches, a stark gray on the paper.

When he finally reached a blank page, he stopped and placed his hand on the bend of the notebook, holding it open. He looked out over the bay, his eyes flicking between all the details spread out below him. Directly below him were a couple of roads that ran along the coast. Not visible from here was the remains of other roads and buildings; he had gathered that they had been destroyed in the Crisis or after, when the watchpoint was being built, to allow for more privacy for the organization. Observation decks like the one he was on had been removed or made accessible only to agents.

There was a dock a little ways down the coast, and he could see boats out on the water, many of them going out to begin a day of fishing. _It must be a simple life,_ he mused before putting his pencil to paper.  The horizon took shape first; uninterrupted sea stretched out to his right and distant land on the left. Vague shapes, meant to be clouds and seabirds, scattered themselves across the sky. He filled in the boats and a few details about the coastline, the trees, those two roads, the foliage covering the remains of what might have once been a thriving coastal community, and set down his pencil, letting it roll to rest against his leg. He allowed himself a smile at the sketch. This was a past time he hadn’t let himself indulge in very much, ten years ago. He hadn’t even really allowed himself this until five years ago, when he had passed by a small shop somewhere in Germany.

He had just finished a job - the details were fuzzy, but it was just a delivery of some sensitive materials to some politician regarding some other politician. He didn’t know, he didn’t care. The delivery had been made under duress, Hanzo having had to fight off mercenaries hired by the subject of his delivery. Many of them had ended up in body bags. Their fault for challenging him.

He had received payment and was lying low in a small town a couple hundred miles away when he noticed a peculiar storefront. It was quaint, reminiscent of two centuries past. There were old books and items, but a small, leather bound notebook had caught his eye. Curiosity got the better of him, and he went inside. Shortly thereafter he had left carrying the notebook and a new set of graphite pencils. The old woman at the register had smiled at him, and he had done his best to give her one in return.

That notebook was still in his bag, filled with sketches of the German countryside, that small town, and everywhere else he had been. People in unique clothes he had seen, omnics with interesting shapes, even just teenagers that would sit at the public fountains and smoke. That notebook was one of the few sentimental things he carried with him; the one in his hand now was its successor, and was already over halfway full - the efforts of one of the few things that brought him some form of peace.

He pulled out his phone. One new email.

 

_I’ll be here! - Mei_

 

He put the phone to sleep. After lunch, then, he would visit her lab. For now, he sat up on the deck and drew.

 

\--

 

His knock on the door of the lab was hesitant; he stood in front of it, subtly shifting from foot to foot like a child.

“Come in!” The cheery voice inside responded in English, but when Hanzo stepped through the door and Mei looked up from her work, she switched effortlessly to Japanese. “How are you today, Hanzo?”

“I am fine,” he said, looking around and taking in the lab. It wasn’t quite what he had expected, but he really didn’t know what he had been expecting. It was fairly well-organized, with several screens and computers that were displaying data and calculations that he couldn’t understand. Mei had a holoscreen in front of her that she was comparing to something on her tablet. There were far less test tubes than Hanzo would have thought there was. “How is your research going?”

Mei smiled. “Wonderfully! I’ve brought some of the data I collected in Antarctica and am checking for the outliers right now. I’ve got a few tests I’ll want to run after that and some calculations that I have to check, but that’s more detailed stuff which I guess is pretty boring if you don’t know what’s going on.” She laughed.

“I admit that a fair amount of this is beyond me,” Hanzo said, shrugging. “I have a business degree and only took the barest amount of science required. You are a climatologist, right? So you’re researching the environment? What specifically?”

“Something is messing with the global ecosystem. There’s been all sorts of natural disasters that just don’t make sense.” Mei pointed at a monitor displaying a map with several red markers. “Each of those markers represents a natural disaster that was either far too intense for the conditions that initially caused it or didn’t seem to have enough build-up beforehand for it to exist. It’s not right.” She frowned. “Something’s happening, and no one knows what’s causing it. There was a lot more data, before, with the ecopoints, but…” She trailed off, sighing. “They’re all gone now. Empty. I have to start almost from scratch again.”

“I am sorry,” Hanzo replied, unsure of how to respond. “You seem very passionate about your work. Would you mind explaining some of it to me in more detail? I find it very interesting.” He didn’t actually feel anything beyond a cursory interest, but he could tell from her excited response he had said the right thing to help cheer her up a bit.

“Sure!” She pointed out one of the markers on the map and started to explain the event, and Hanzo held his attention on her. He didn’t have to respond to her beyond a few nods or a well-placed couple of questions, leaving her to explain her research. An hour or so passed and he found himself legitimately drawn into what she was saying, even if he didn’t understand all of it.

It was a refreshing exchange; there was no mention of his past, of Genji, of anything beyond light conversation and Mei’s research. It was what he had needed. Ever since he had gotten here, all he could think about was Genji and the Shimada-gumi and what he had done; being able to detach from that was the greatest relief he could imagine right now.

When they parted ways, Hanzo was smiling. It was small, a slight curve to his lips, but it was there. He felt lighter for the rest of the night.

 

\--

 

He was walking the trails again next morning when he saw a dropship fly towards the base. He frowned as he remembered Genji’s text about McCree being back soon. He was going to have to deal with the cowboy again, then. _Best to avoid the base for now,_ he thought. _I have not come close to exploring all of these trails anyways._ He took his time and stopped often to draw some of the local plants and wildlife, but ended up losing track of time, so by the time he got back to base it was nearly late afternoon. He checked his phone and found he had a new message.

 

_Hana: hey want to make dinner with me tonight? i’m not the best cook but i figured “why not” so yeah. you don’t eat dinner with the rest of the team anyways_

 

He thought for a moment before responding.

 

_Hanzo: Do you mind if I invite Mei?_

 

 _It wouldn’t hurt,_ he thought. _She was friendly enough yesterday, and it would be nice to converse with both her and Hana._ He wasn’t used to this, to having… not friends, maybe, but people he could talk to some. Acquaintances. His phone buzzed twice.

 

_Hana: the more the merrier! mei’s pretty cool ;)_

 

Hanzo could see her smug smile at the pun. Mei had shown him her weapon.

 

_Hana: anyways we should eat maybe around 5 in the rec room, i havent eaten much today. got distracted lol_

 

Hanzo shot off an email to Mei.

 

_Hana Song and I are going to eat dinner in the rec room at five, if you wish to join us. - Hanzo._

 

He checked the time, realizing it was nearing on four. Mei might not see the email in time. He frowned. _Oh well,_ he thought. _She usually eats with the other members on the base._

He had over an hour until dinner. He fidgeted with his bag and considered pulling out his sketchbook again, but he didn’t have the sort of mental focus right then to really try to draw and he knew it. He sighed. If there was something he had really been lacking, it was focus. His normally sharp mind had become somewhat dulled by the emotions of the past week and a half. Now was the time to let himself meditate properly. He set an alarm on his phone and settled onto his knees.

 

\--

 

Mei had ended up emailing him back when he was meditating, confirming that she would be there. Despite that, Hanzo was slightly surprised to see her and Hana chatting in the kitchenette and laughing. Hana heard him first and turned to greet him.

“Hanzo! You hungry?” she said, grinning.

“Given that I accidentally neglected lunch, very,” he replied. She raised an eyebrow and flicked him on the shoulder.

“I have the ingredients to make Bibimbap,” Hana said.

“Bibimbap? I haven’t had that in a while!” Mei said excitedly. “I think last time I had some I was checking out the abandoned ecopoint near Sokcho.” Hana opened the fridge and began pulling out the ingredients, lining the containers of vegetables up on the counter.

“I already put in the beef to marinate earlier, so that’ll be ready to cook whenever,” she said. She began directing them to cut up vegetables while she prepped the water to boil and made the bean sprouts and spinach. They were just starting to cook the remaining vegetables when Hanzo heard a metallic clicking sound. His head shot up to the door and he felt his stomach drop as the cowboy stepped through the doorway, eyes shut as he took a deep breath.

“Smells mighty fine,” he said. He finally opened his eyes and paused in the doorway when he saw Hanzo. The archer did his best to avoid McCree’s eyes. He didn’t want any confrontation right now.

“We’re making Bibimbap,” Hana said. She was no doubt aware of the sudden tension in Hanzo’s shoulders, but pointedly ignored it; for this Hanzo was grateful. “Lena’s cooking tonight and while I appreciate _her_ , I don’t appreciate her _cooking_. British food is weird and bland.” Hana’s nose wrinkled as McCree chuckled and stepped into the room.

“I’m inclined to agree with ya,” he said. “After a week of either military rations or shitty fast food I’m fond of anything homemade, though. I heard ya in here and thought I’d stop by and say hello before I headed to eat with the others. Y’all won’t be joining, then?”

“No,” Mei answered from where she was portioning out rice and vegetables. “How did your mission go?” She turned and leaned against the counter so she could see McCree.

“I debriefed when I got back this mornin’, and Winston’s probably gonna send out the basics, but I found some really weird shit.” McCree’s spurs jingled as he slid into one of the bar stools on the other side of the counter. Hanzo turned around to the stove and began cracking eggs onto the pan, listening but staying removed from the conversation.

“Did Winston tell ya what I was doing?” Hanzo saw Mei’s head shake from the corner of his eye. “Basically, I went to an old watchpoint in Madagascar because there were some news reports Winston found of weird activity around the base. I get down there and find that the entire place is completely trashed, like someone had turned it upside-down looking for something. Couldn’t find much evidence as to who besides a few eyewitness reports of some new guys in the area. Seemed real suspicious, snooping around the base and the like.”

There was a sharp inhale from Mei. “Do you think it was Talon?” Hanzo had to steel himself from reacting. It was a name he had heard before, a few times, when he was on jobs. To hear it here was disturbing.

“Maybe,” McCree said. “Whoever was there seemed to know the best places to get information, because a lot of the destruction was pretty deliberate, like they were hiding where they were looking. I could barely tell myself.” Hanzo coughed lightly as he picked up one of the eggs with a spatula and moved it towards the bowls on the counter.

“Excuse me,” he said quietly. Mei hopped away.

“Oh, sorry!” she said.

“No, I am interrupting you. I apologize,” he replied, shaking his head. McCree had fallen silent. Hanzo could feel the cowboy’s gaze boring into his back and did his best to ignore it.

“Most of the databanks had been destroyed, but I did find something in one of them. Some old files on the crisis. They felt off, though, like they had been tampered with. Winston’s gonna see if he can figure out what’s wrong.” Hanzo shifted the last two eggs into the proper bowls and stood back to allow Hana to get the sauce. “Genji’s heading out tomorrow, too.” Hanzo’s head flipped around, and he cursed himself for giving away the fact that he hadn’t known that. Now that he was facing him, he could see McCree raising an eyebrow. He composed himself. “Got a message from his mentor a few hours ago. Said he needed a bit of help getting out of Nepal. When I ran into him in the hall just now he told me Winston had approved him going, so he’ll be gone these next couple of days.”

“His mentor is one of the Shambali, right?” Hana asked. “Those omnic monks that Mondatta belonged to.”

“Yep. Genji invited him to join, but he couldn’t at the time. Apparently he’s ready now,” McCree said. He looked at the bowls Hana was putting the last of the sauce on. “Looks like y’all are about ready to eat. I’ll leave ya to it, then. Good night Mei, Hana.” He paused, then surprised everyone. “Hanzo.” He left the room in silence.

After a moment, Hana spoke. “Well, that sure was interesting,” she said, clapping her hands together. “Spooky Talon stuff. Food’s ready, though!” She handed bowls and chopsticks to Mei and Hanzo and they took them to the table.

“Looks good,” Mei said. She took a big bite and smiled. “It _is_ good.” Hana grinned and took a bite herself.

“Nice work, guys,” she said. Hanzo nodded in agreement, but the conversation with McCree left him distracted. Genji hadn’t told him he would be leaving. Granted, he hadn’t talked to Genji for a few days, and according to McCree he had only just gotten confirmation he could go, but it still felt strange. He could barely focus on the conversation Mei and Hana had begun, lost in his own thoughts. They took pity on him and accepted his occasional grunts and nods. He helped them wash up dishes afterwards, then politely excused himself back to his room. Hana watched him, a hint of worry in her eyes.

He stared at his phone. He had opened up the message app to text Genji, but the words he wanted to say refused to come. In frustration he put the screen to sleep and set it on his bedside table. He had no right to expect that sort of communication from Genji, not after he had scorned all the other communications and ignored him since they had fought. He was still trying to find what he could say when his phone vibrated. He scrambled to pick it up.

 

 _Genji: i know i said i wouldnt text you but i really need to talk to you and im leaving tomorrow morning for a few days so this is the last chance we’ll have_ . _please come up to the garden again?_

 

Hanzo felt a mix of shame and relief wash over him at Genji’s text. His brother was making the first move, as always. He was unsure how to reply, so he forwent it and shoved the phone in his pocket. He stood up with a deep breath and steeled himself for what was to come before leaving his room.

 

\--

 

The garden was much the same; a path surrounded by tall grasses and wildflowers that led to a wide clearing. Genji was sitting cross-legged in the grass facing away from the path, towards the somewhat scraggly tree that headed the clearing. Hanzo made no attempt to approach silently and settled in a seiza across from where Genji sat. He rested his hands on his thighs and tried to think of what to say.

“Genji, I-” he started and stopped. That wouldn’t work. “What I said-” He cut himself off again. Nothing seemed right. He stared at the grass in silence.

Finally, Genji spoke, still facing away. “You blame yourself for what happened to me.” Hanzo furrowed his brow.

“Yes, of course,” he said, his voice weak. “How could I not? Even with all of the elder’s influence, their,” he paused, trying to get the word out, “ _manipulation_ , I was still ultimately responsible.”

“For the longest time, I blamed you as well. Exclusively. The elders crossed my mind, yes, but it was you that I hated.” Hanzo swallowed, his throat dry. “I got my revenge for the most part. I took them down with Overwatch’s help. But imagine my surprise when I found out I was not alone in this endeavor. Someone else was also hunting down the elders. I actually reached one of them just after this mystery person had finished their business.” He stopped, and Hanzo saw his head tilt down slightly. “They had an arrow in their throat, with steel gray fletching. An agonizingly familiar arrow.” Hanzo’s heart picked up its pace as Genji spoke.

“I think that was a turning point for me,” he said. “I had heard you had left the clan, but knowing that you, too, were hunting down the elders and attempting to cut the head off the beast that was the clan? It made things different. When I went to the Shambali monastery a few months later, I wasn’t quite the same. Zenyatta, my mentor, must have picked up on that, and he took advantage of that change. He was a counselor, a guide for me, in ways I didn’t know I needed.” A green glow seemed to form in front of Genji, its source hidden by his body. Hanzo squinted, trying to figure out what it was.

“I’ve learned to accept what I am, Hanzo, and I’ve learned to forgive you. It has been a hard journey for me, but I’ve made it, and now I want to help you make it. I want to help you forgive yourself.” He stood up, his hands holding something out of sight in front of him. “We both do.” He turned around. Hanzo gasped quietly. He hadn’t seen her in so long, hadn’t expected to ever see her again, but Kaba was there, looped around Genji’s arm and blinking at him slowly. He stood up and reached out, but pulled back before he could touch her. She looked up at him and began slowly unwinding herself, her small claws wrapping around Genji’s fingers to stabilize herself and her green scales sliding along the plating on his arm. She nudged her head towards Hanzo’s hand, still frozen just away from her side.

“Kaba,” he whispered. He looked up at Genji. “I can see her.” The words came out in a soft breath, but charged the air with emotion strong enough to seem palpable. “I can see her.” It was louder this time, and Hanzo felt dizzy, dizzy with joy, with fear, but mostly, dizzy with wonder. Kaba pushed herself under Hanzo’s hand, encouraging him to pet her, which he did, running his fingers along her smooth scales in a way he hadn’t been able to for so long. Tears filled his eyes and spilled down his cheeks, and he looked at Genji’s visor.

“We can do this, brother,” Genji said, and for once, Hanzo didn’t focus on the metallic filter over his words. This was his brother speaking to him, this was his voice. “Together.” Kaba quickly climbed up to Hanzo’s shoulder and out of the way as Hanzo, choking out sobs, reached forward to pull his brother into a tight hug.

“Together,” he agreed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Told y'all there would be McCree and dragons.
> 
> I've never actually made Bibimbap myself (a dining court near my dorm last year would have it sometimes but I think I got it like once) but it sounds really good? And doesn't look too difficult. Anyways, to supplement my knowledge on the making of Bibimbap I checked out [this recipe](https://mykoreankitchen.com/bibimbap-korean-mixed-rice-with-meat-and-assorted-vegetables/). It's probably going on my "to make" list because I love cooking and it looks good.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter DEFINITELY took a turn from its original intention. I hadn't started writing it yet when my beta sidled onto Discord and was proposed an idea that I just... HAD to do. The only thing really retained from the original concept is the very last scene of this, and that's been heavily modified in the face of the entire rest of the chapter. You guys will like it, I hope :D  
> There's a scene that's... a bit awkward language-wise when you're trying to think about it and I'm sorry. I hope it comes across well enough that y'all understand! If not, I can make an attempt haha.
> 
> As always shout out to [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/) for being a wonderful beta! In addition to that, shout out to her for letting her own selfish desires drive her to send me a message that changed this chapter entirely. Love u. Music-wise, this chapter is brought to you by Lord Huron's entire [Strange Trails](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiwWgN5O3WQ) album, repeated about three and a half times. "The World Ender" is a Reaper song, and erasing a bit of context from "Fool For Love" makes me cry about McHanzo (take away the context of "another man" and just make it Hanzo attempting to save Jesse after he's kidnapped by Talon ;-;).
> 
> I'm on tumblr [here](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/)! Send me an ask, any time! Also, [here](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/tagged/scales-and-vectors) is a tag for my fic. It has little "thought process" type posts I make and one ficlet from Angela's perspective in chapter 2.

“Are those your dragons, Hanzo? Father said you got your dragons; can I see them?” Hanzo blinked and looked away from the pair as Suke came dashing across the courtyard from inside the dojo. He watched his little sister nearly trip on a stray rock and held back a giggle. He couldn’t have been that clumsy when he was eight, could he? Turning around, he presented his younger sister with the two blue dragons currently wrapping themselves around his left arm. Their scales gleamed in the morning sun, and the soft light made it seem like their golden manes were glowing dimly.

Suke’s eyes widened and she let out a soft breath. “They’re so pretty,” she said. Her gaze darted between Hanzo and the dragons and she tentatively reached out towards them, freezing when they cocked their head to the side in unison to stare at her fingers. Curiosity thrummed through Hanzo’s bond with them, and this time Hanzo did giggle at the strange sensation.

“Go on, you can touch them,” he said. When Suke hesitated again, Hanzo gently thrust his arm towards his sister. The dragons seemed to take it as encouragement and pushed their snouts forward the rest of the way to start sniffing delicately at Suke’s hand. Suke’s fingers twitched and Hanzo could tell she was holding backing laughter.

“It tickles!” she said. The dragons weren’t deterred by the movement. The one slightly further from Hanzo began pushing his snout underneath Suke’s palm, letting impatience flow through the bond.

“He is very eager for you to actually pet him,” Hanzo said, smiling. Suke let go of her fear and began to run her hand along the dragon’s back, wonder in her eyes.

“He?” she asked, not looking away from the dragon.

“He. They are brother and sister, like us,” Hanzo explained.

Suke bit her lip. “Yeah, I guess,” she said, her nose scrunching up. “What’s their names?” The change in subject was swift, harried, and Hanzo squinted at his sister.

“The one you’re petting is Raijū, and this one here is his sister, Mizuchi.” Mizuchi crawled over Raijū, who squeaked indignantly at the clawed foot using his face as a step. She clambered up Suke’s sleeve and began sniffing the side of her face. Suke began laughing again, unable to cover it up. Hanzo hesitated, but he felt he had to ask. “What do you mean you guess? I am your big brother, and you are my little sister. Even if Raijū and Mizuchi are twins, they are still brother and sister like you and I.”

“Yeah, well,” Suke said, hesitating, “What if I don’t really want to be your little sister?” Hanzo’s lips parted in shock. What had he done? Why didn’t she want to be his little sister? Suke must have noticed, because her eyes widened again and she shook her head. “No, not like that! It’s just…” She bit her lip again and mumbled something Hanzo couldn’t quite catch.

“What did you say? I couldn’t understand,” Hanzo asked.

“I don’t want to be your little sister because I want to be your little _brother_ ,” she said, releasing it all in one breath. Hanzo’s brow furrowed in confusion for a moment, and Suke watched him nervously before he realized what she was saying.

“Do you mean like Aunt Rin?” he asked.

“Aunt Rin? What about her?”

“When she was little everyone thought she was a boy, but then she told them all she was really a girl and they started calling her Rin,” Hanzo explained.

Suke’s eyes lit up. “I think so. I’m a boy.” Hanzo nodded.

“Do you have a name you like instead of Suke? If you want to stay Suke, that is okay, but Aunt Rin changed her name, so you can too.”

Suke shook his head. “Not yet, but you can help me find one, right?” His eyes gleamed hopefully.

“Of course, brother.” Hanzo smiled at his _brother’s_ gleeful expression. “Ok, well, we should probably tell Father,” he said, looking at his little brother. “So he knows I have an annoying little brother, not sister.” He grinned at Suke’s glare. It was hard to take him seriously when Mizuchi was trying to stay balanced on his shoulder. She fell with an undignified squeal when Suke crossed his arms, and Hanzo and Suke both paused for a moment before falling to the ground, laughing.

“You can fly! Why did you not catch yourself?” Hanzo managed to get out in between his laughing. Mizuchi pulsed annoyance at him and raised her chin haughtily - right before her brother tackled her onto the ground, sending Hanzo and Suke deeper into their peals of laughter.

\--

 

“Hanzo!” Genji’s excited shout carried down the hall and through Hanzo’s open door. Hanzo let out a little huff of annoyance - Father had told him that if he achieved top marks, he could finally begin helping with some of the clan work; Genji was interrupting him. The fourteen year old set his math book to the side and turned towards the door. Raijū and Mizuchi lifted their heads from where they had been dozing under his desk light.

“Yes, Genji?” His brother stuck his head past the door frame, the rest of his body hidden. A wide grin covered his face. Hanzo gave him an unimpressed look. “What do you need?” Genji was practically vibrating with excitement as he stepped inside and revealed the little green dragon perched on his shoulder.

Hanzo gasped. “Your dragon showed up?” Genji nodded and held out his arm towards Hanzo. The dragon carefully crawled along it and pushed its snout forward. “What is its name?” Hanzo reached out and gave it a gentle scratch under the chin; his own dragons blinked lazily at the newcomer.

“Well, I wanted her to have a cool name, like yours, so I thought of naming her after an oni or something, but then I remembered all of those Greek stories I read,” Genji started. The dragon hopped from Genji’s arm to Hanzo’s, and finally Raijū and Mizuchi’s curiosity got the better of them. They creeped forward and climbed onto Hanzo’s shoulder, keeping their distance. “There was the story of Hercules, and in that story, he had to get some sort of belt from a group of warrior women called Amazons. What better name for a dragon than their warrior queen, Hippolyta?”

“A strong, dignified name for a dragon,” Hanzo agreed. Genji smiled, the edge of his mouth quirking up mischievously.

“Hippolyta’s kind of hard to say every time, though, so I thought of just calling her Hippo.”

Hanzo’s eyebrow quirked up. “‘ _Hippo_?’ Isn’t that the English word for-”

“Hippopotamus, yes. So I’m gonna call her Kaba,” Genji finished triumphantly.

“You are naming your dragon Hippopotamus,” Hanzo said, giving Genji a flat stare. The dragon in question began crawling slowly along Hanzo’s arms towards Raijū and Mizuchi. “Your dragon spirit, who will be your protector your entire life, is going to be named after a big, fat, ugly pig creature?”

“Her full name is Hippolyta! I’ll just call her Kaba!”

“I am never calling her Kaba,” Hanzo said. Hippolyta was a few inches from the twins, now, and made an attempt to stretch her nose towards Mizuchi, who was slightly closer. “That is an insulting name for a dragon spirit. Give her some dignity, Genji.” As if right on cue, Mizuchi sneezed. Hippolyta squeaked in fright and lost her grip on Hanzo’s clothing. She made a few scrambling attempts to catch onto the fabric, but her claws just slid off and she fell to the floor, landing flat on her back. She quickly flipped back onto her stomach and rushed over to Genji, hiding behind his feet. Genji burst into laughter.

“Very dignified, Kaba,” he managed to choke out.

“I defended you!” Hanzo yelled, outraged. Amusement pulsed at him from both Raijū and Mizuchi, which he ignored. They gently floated down to the floor and approached Hippolyta, who squeaked again and retreated even farther behind Genji’s feet. Raijū let out a snorting noise - laughter, Hanzo guessed - and stopped right in front of Genji’s feet. He glanced up at Genji then quickly darted his mouth forward to catch the tip of Genji’s shoelace and give it a tug, untying it.

“Hey!” Genji pulled his foot away from the dragon, but Raijū’s grip was strong and Mizuchi was already darting back to nip at his other heel, and Hanzo found himself watching his brother fall flat on his back. Hippolyta had darted out of the way just in time. She looked ready to hop away, but the shiny plastic tip of the other end of the shoelace seemed to catch her eye and she pounced on it, trapping it beneath her claws. She didn’t even seem to realize that Raijū was right next to her until he let out another snorting sound. Her eyes widened and she made an attempt to back up, but was stopped when she ran into Mizuchi. Mizuchi let out a little snort of her own and pushed her snout under Hippolyta’s in a way that seemed to soothe her. Raijū slinked to her other side and gave her a sniff before resting his chin on her back and curling up on the ground and closing his eyes. The bewildered Hippolyta was forced to the ground under the weight of the twins as they looped themselves around and over her and fell back asleep.

“I think they like her,” Hanzo said, watching as the twins’ purring began lulling Hippolyta to sleep. Genji watched too, propped up on his elbows, his embarrassment at being tripped fading away and a smile tugging up the corners of his mouth.

“Of course they do. You like me, don’t you?”

 

\--

 

“I am busy, Genji.”

“Come _on_ , Hanzo! You’re always busy! Take a break for once.” Hanzo leveled a glare at his younger brother, who was attempting to give him a ridiculously pouty expression. Even Hippolyta seemed to be playing along; she had slinked over to Hanzo’s shoulder and begun making pitiful purring noises. Hanzo picked her up and deposited her on his desk, where Mizuchi was dozing. Hippolyta’s tail accidentally landed on Mizuchi’s face, but the green dragon made no attempt to move it. Raijū sat up on the windowsill, ignoring the scene behind him in favor of watching the birds.

“I have duties to attend to, as do you. I know Father has assigned you to work for Yuito. Why are you going to the arcade? You are fifteen, you should be beyond such frivolities.” Mizuchi whacked at Hippolyta’s tail, annoyed.

Genji scratched the back of his neck casually. “I finished that. Yuito said I was done for the day.”

“You are a bad liar,” Hanzo said, pointedly turning away and focusing on the ledgers on his desk. “You should work on that.” Mizuchi, fed up with Hippolyta’s obstinance, gave the green dragon’s tail a gentle nip. Hippolyta growled and swiped a claw at Mizuchi. The older dragon drew her face out of range and gave Hippolyta an unimpressed look.

“Hey, tell Mizuchi to lay off Kaba!” Genji said, darting forward to pick Hippolyta up.

“If _Hippolyta_ were not being such a pest, she would not need to do that.” Hanzo picked up his pen as Mizuchi let out a huff of agreement. “Go attend to your duties, Genji.” There was a rustling of fabric as Genji shifted behind him, but his brother stayed where he was. Hanzo sighed and looked back over his shoulder. “You must begin to accept responsibilities, Genji. One day I will be the head of the clan and you will be at my side; you must be able to handle your duties by then.”

“That’s a long way off. You’re barely even an adult yourself, Hanzo,” Genji said. “Just this one time, let me go the arcade instead. I’ll help Yuito next time, I promise.” Hanzo looked at his brother, Hippolyta floating above his shoulder, and let out a breath.

“This time. I will handle Yuito, but next time you must do it yourself.” Genji grinned.

“Thank you, Hanzo! Promise you’ll take a break soon, just for a little bit?” Hanzo gave Genji a strained smile.

“Of course.” Genji ran off down the hall.

 

\--

 

The slide of the window alerted Hanzo immediately of the intruder in his room. His hand was already on the hilt of his sword by the time he was fully awake and staring across the room at the shadow crawling through his window. He must have left it unlocked - _foolish, leaving an opening like that_ \- and now some assassin had the _gall_ to climb in and - stumble? _Who is this bumbling fool?_ The man took a couple of steps to the desk and flicked the light on, bathing the room in dim light. Hanzo’s hand unclenched from the sword hilt and he sat up to stare at his brother across the room. A quick glance to the clock on the night stand revealed it was three in the morning.

“Where were you?” Hanzo hissed. Genji froze and turned around slowly.

“This isn’t my room,” he said.

“Obviously,” Hanzo said. “Answer my question. Where were you at three in the morning?”

Genji smiled, the lazy grin of someone heavily inebriated. “I was out,” he said, slurring his words. “Meant to climb in through my window, guess I didn’t go down far enough.” He stretched his arms above his head and yawned, barely managing to remain standing.

“You were gone all afternoon; you missed _training_ , and the first I see of you since this morning is you climbing into my room at three AM, waking me up. I was preparing to kill you, thinking you an intruder.”  The twins were opting not to make an appearance, but Hanzo could feel his anger mirrored in their bond.

Genji rolled his eyes. “Relax, Hanzo.” He made a placating gesture. “I’ll train doubly hard tomorrow.”

“That does not excuse your behavior, Genji,” Hanzo snapped. He stood up from his bed and crossed the room. “You continue to neglect your responsibilities in favor of this - behavior! I never indulged like this, and anything similar I did, I had long given it up by the time I was twenty.” Hanzo gestured to Genji’s drunken state. “The elders are not happy.”

Genji’s brow furrowed angrily. “Why should I care what they think? It’s not like they actually care, as long as they have you, oh perfect one,” he spat.

“Get out.” Hanzo’s tone was icy.

“Or what?” Genji crossed his arms.

“Get. Out.” Genji remained rooted to the spot, and Hanzo’s eyes narrowed further as his voice dropped to a near-whisper. "Now.”

“Fine.” Genji stormed out the door, all but slamming it behind him. His footsteps faded away down the hall. Hanzo clenched his fists. _An insolent, foolish child. Spoiled rotten and prone to outbursts._ He took in a deep breath to center himself and flexed his fingers open before crawling under his sheets and pulling his body in on itself. Raijū and Mizuchi unwound themselves from his arm and lay on the pillow around his head. He fell asleep to their faint glow.

 

\--

 

Sojiro Shimada had hardly been in the ground a day when the elders began discussing Genji.

“You are the head of the clan now. He must fall in line.”

“His position is at your side. Sojiro spoiled him for too long, and he has forgotten his duty to this family.”

“If he does not bow, he must be taken care of.”

Silence followed the last elder’s statement.

“Taken care of?” Hanzo kept his voice even, but only just.

Another elder spoke up. “He is a drain on our money and a liability. If he does not start taking his duties seriously, he must go.”

“It would be best you not forget you are speaking about the second son of Sojiro Shimada,” Hanzo said warningly.

“Does he act it, Hanzo?” The first elder spoke. “You have been shouldering his burdens since he was old enough to have them. You should know better than anyone here how his actions have affected the clan. He uses our money, but refuses to participate as he should. He is a burden.”

“Sojiro favored him over you. He let his little ‘Sparrow’ fly free while you worked for your keep. Genji's refusal now is disrespectful to his father's legacy.” Hanzo grit his teeth, unable to deny their statements.

“I will… talk to him,” he conceded. “Warn him.” The elders nodded in agreement.

“Very well.”

 

\--

 

Genji was still home, tonight. His night trips had become no less frequent since he had stumbled drunkenly into Hanzo’s room, so the fact that he was not out now was unusual. The clock on the nightstand read half past eleven at night, and Hanzo was reading one final report before he prepared himself for bed. He rubbed his eyes tiredly as he tried to keep himself awake.

Quick footsteps in the hall startled him into alertness, and he felt Mizuchi and Raijū stirring from inside the tattoo. His hand automatically went to his sword as the footsteps passed his door and headed in the direction of the dojo; there should not be any servants roaming the halls, and the security officers were not allowed in the residential area of the castle. He creeped towards the door and slid it open silently, managing to catch a glimpse of the figure just as it darted around the corner. Hanzo slung the sheath of the sword around his back and carried it in his hands. He padded cautiously around the corner and watched the figure take another corner, confirming the destination. He continued following the man until they entered into the brightly lit dojo, revealing the shadow’s identity.

“Genji.” His brother froze at the close end of the bridge. “Where are you going?” His brother turned, and for the first time Hanzo noticed he had his sword strapped to his back and a bag in his hand. “Why do you have those?”

Genji swallowed. “I was going to do some training.” Hanzo nearly snorted at the obvious lie.

“At midnight? Do you take me for a fool? Where are you actually headed?” If Genji thought he would slip away easily this time, he was mistaken. Hanzo was going to issue the final warning, here and now.

Genji seemed to come to a decision. “I’m getting out,” he said, looking towards the exit. “I’m leaving. Not coming back.” Static seemed to fill Hanzo’s head. Leaving? “This is not the life I was meant for, Hanzo.” Hanzo glared at Genji and walked towards him.

“You think you can leave so easily? Just like that?” He brought his sword out in front of him and stared his brother down. “Do you, Genji?”

Genji drew his sword, anger contorting his face. “Hanzo, you don’t have to do this.”

 

\--

 

“You said Kaba.” Hanzo squinted in confusion as he pulled away from the hug. Tear tracks glinted on his cheeks in the fading sunlight; he made no move to wipe them away.

“What?” Genji’s dragon was carefully picking her way to his other shoulder, her smooth scales sliding against his neck and making him shiver.

“You called her Kaba,” Genji repeated, amused. “Not Hippolyta.” Hanzo realized what Genji was talking about and groaned.

“That is unimportant.”

Genji laughed. “It is very important, Hanzo. You’ve called her Kaba maybe three times in my memory, one of them just now. Has the name grown on you?”

“Upon further review, I have decided that hippopotamuses are regal creatures as well. They may look… ungainly, but they are extremely strong and deadly. A fitting name for a dragon.” Genji laughed again, louder, and Hanzo couldn’t hold back the smile. He tried hiding it by wiping away the tears. He let himself listen to Genji’s laugh for a minute, just to absorb it how it was now. Kaba floated from his shoulder and began to circle the both of them.

“Hanzo, I don’t want you to think that it’s wrong if I can’t see them right now, but I do want to ask. How are Raijū and Mizuchi?” Cold settled in his limbs and took away the feelings that had been warming him. His gaze drifted down, unable to meet the line of Genji’s visor. Genji picked up on the sudden tension in his body. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.”

Hanzo grimaced. “No, it is,” he searched for the right word, “okay. It is okay. I just have not…” He took a deep breath and looked up. “I have not seen either of them since that night, except in combat.” Genji’s fist clenched.

“At all?”

Hanzo nodded in confirmation. “At all.” His heart clenched in sorrow. “It seems I have done enough to draw that sort of ire.” He chuckled grimly. “I have not even felt their emotions. The bond feels almost vacant in my mind, like they are blocking it. It has been like that for ten years.” Genji was silent, his visor facing away. Hanzo wondered what he was thinking.

“Are you sure?” The words surprised Hanzo.

“What do you mean? I am very sure I have not seen them.”

Genji looked at him again. “Are you sure it is them blocking the bond?” Hanzo’s brow furrowed; how could it be anything else? Genji noticed Hanzo’s expression and spoke. “After that night, when I woke up again and realized what had happened, I felt the same thing with Kaba’s bond. She was cut off from me, the bond empty. I thought she was doing it, and for five years, she was only there on the edge of my sword when I needed her.”

“It was only after I left Overwatch and met my mentor in the Shambali that I learned the truth. I had been blocking her out myself, letting my anger towards you blind me. She was not responsible, but she was a tangible connection to you, in my mind, and I did not want anything to do with that. When Zenyatta helped me find my peace, the bond opened again.” Hanzo could hear the gentle happiness in Genji’s voice, but could not relate to the feeling. Genji was implying that Hanzo had been shutting the twins out for years; on top of what he had done to Genji, he had done that to them. How could he?

“You think it is me?” Hanzo’s mind whirled.

“It may be,” Genji said, placing a comforting hand on Hanzo’s shoulder. “I know what you are thinking, brother. Breathe. I told you, we want to help you.” Kaba landed on Hanzo’s other shoulder again and nuzzled his cheek. Hanzo unconsciously leaned into the touch. “Mizuchi and Raijū understand, I am sure. Kaba did. They just want you back.”

Hanzo took a deep breath. It was a lot to take in - seeing Kaba, learning the truth of his bond, talking to Genji like this - and he had to keep himself from being overwhelmed. Genji looked at the rising moon.

“I wish I could spend more time with you now, Hanzo, but I leave for Nepal very early in the morning, and must head back to my quarters. Will you join me on the walk down?” he said.

Hanzo shook his head. “I will stay out here for a little longer. It is a lot to take in, and the garden is peaceful.”

Genji nodded. “I will be back in a couple of days with my mentor. If you will let him, he can assist us as well. Good night, brother.”

“Good night, Genji.” His brother pulled him into one last hug before leaving down the path he came. Hanzo sat down under the moonlight and began counting his breaths.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _So many noodle dragons._  
>     
> I hope that Genji telling Hanzo about being trans didn't feel too out of place. I'm trans myself and had another trans friend of mine read it, but I'm still a bit anxious about it. Hanzo and Genji were very close to one another in their youth and their dragons meant a lot, and I thought that it would be a good moment for both of them to tie to their dragons. Being trans isn't an issue in the future. Fuck that noise.
> 
> [An explanation for Hanzo and Genji's dragons' names! They do have meaning (especially Hanzo's) and I just... really loved naming them ;-;](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/post/163307679964/dragon-names-in-sav)  
>    
> Genji's deadname has meaning, too. Suke was the name of the daughter a notable shogun, Tokugawa Ieyasu, who rose to power with the help of Hanzo's namesake, Hattori Hanzō. It was spelled like "leader, governer" but meant "helper" which I think is the perfect hypothetical name for a second child. Of course, it's his deadname, so it's not like it matters, I just really love naming shit.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for the delay in posting! There were some extenuating circumstances for both my beta and I (busy week, work, and passing of a pet for me, family reunion for Abby) and we just managed to get it done today. Thank you all for your patience. I do also want to say that from this point on I'm going to be moving to an every other week posting schedule rather than weekly because school is about to get back in session and obviously I need to do well in my classes, as well as moving into my first apartment this Saturday. My first day of classes is actually the day of the eclipse :0 and the peak time for me (with over 90% of the sun covered, hell yeah) is between two classes so it'll be rad.  
> I just want you guys to know that even if I don't reply to a comment, I see it and really appreciate it. You're all so sweet and I'm really glad you're liking it so far :) It's just been so much fun writing this for you guys and really getting to explore these characters that mean so much to me.   
> Shoot, forgot to mention this first time around, so I'm adding it in now: There's a description of a panic attack in this chapter. It starts at, "They clattered loudly as they hit the floor, but the sound seemed muffled to him, as though he were under water." and ends with "'Breathing better now?'" 
> 
> Obviously, shout out to [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/) for betaing my fic! She always knows those good good moments for a lil bit of introspection and reaction and also makes me far less clunky. The album of the chapter is [Zaba](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFuSoPbg2tI&index=1&list=PL2kI801DjQIs-ZII-2Q8rFBjJ0tkdvusd) from Glass Animals. If you're wondering why I always include the music I listen to while writing it's just because I really like music and listening to it and sharing it so... Enjoy ;D
> 
> As always, I'm on tumblr at [praesaepe](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/). Ask/submit box is always open. The tag for the fic is [here](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/tagged/scales-and-vectors) and includes stuff like asks I've gotten about SaV, posts I've made about it, an explanation of Hanzo and Genji's dragons' names, and a little ficlet from Angela's POV in chapter 2.  
> Kudos and comments are appreciated!!

Loath as he was to admit it, the meditation hadn’t helped Hanzo find any peace. Every time he was close to clearing his mind, the blocked bond weighed heavy and unavoidable like a stone in his gut. He had stayed out in the garden for an hour before admitting defeat and retreating back to his room. His sleep was troubled, more so than usual; he finally gave up on the effort when he woke up before dawn, drenched in sweat.

At times like these, there was only one remedy he could imagine to help him center himself. Storm Bow’s case seemed to gleam as he pulled it from underneath his bed. He had avoided it since the confrontation with the doctor, but in the past few years, nothing had been as comforting to him as the feel of a bow working smoothly under his hands. He made his way to the main practice room just as the first rays of the sun were peeking over the horizon.

“Athena, can you arrange the targets based on my previous visit?” he asked, kneeling over the case and pulling Storm Bow from within.

“It is still in my logs, yes,” she said. The appropriate targets popped up. Hanzo reached back to his quiver and pulled out an arrow, pausing to look at it. A sleek, dark shaft, gray fletching - the same design of arrow he had been using since he was a teenager. The same design of arrow Genji had found in the eye socket of one of the Shimada-gumi. Hanzo closed his eyes and steadied himself. This was meant to be a moment of meditation for him; it would be best if he did not allow his thoughts to stray like this.

He notched it and lifted the bow, staring down the target. It was only ten meters away, a shot a young child could make. He focused on his actions: A breath in, a breath out, his hand pulling back on the string, strong and steady, another breath in - release. The arrow pierced into the target with a  _ thwack _ , slightly to the right of the bullseye. Hanzo frowned. How had he missed that?

The only course of action was to continue to try, so he drew another arrow and notched it again. Steady breathing, firm pull - this time the arrow was to the left of the bullseye. Hanzo was well aware of the fact that he was not a perfect shot. No human could have 100 percent accuracy, nor could any omnic. He had been training with Storm Bow his entire life, though, and a shot at only ten meters would always be a bullseye. A shot at thirty meters would always be a bullseye. He drew another arrow and fired. Too high. The fourth arrow was too low. Frustration began flooding through him as he drew his fifth arrow and fired. It barely made it onto the target. He dropped his bow on the ground, shrugged his quiver off his shoulders. They clattered loudly as they hit the floor, but the sound seemed muffled to him, as though he were under water.

What use was he if he could not shoot? The blocked bond pushed to the forefront of his mind. He was keeping them away outside of battle, and now he could not even bring them out in the heat of it. Genji had been trying to be helpful, Hanzo knew, but the knowledge that he had refused his dragons all these years was a terrible burden he could barely begin to face on top of everything else.

Somewhere on the periphery of his awareness he could hear Athena’s voice, but the words were meaningless noise he could not begin to decipher as he fell to his knees. His stomach roiled and panic seized his mind. It flooded him entirely, setting his heart pounding and making it hard for him to breath. A tingling sensation washed over him, as if someone had cracked an egg over his head and the contents were sliding down to cover his entire body.  _ My fault, my fault, my fault _ , his mind looped.  _ I am keeping them away. _ There wasn’t even energy to keep him upright, and he felt himself curling up on the floor, drawing in ragged, gasping breaths, but unable to bring in enough oxygen.  _ First Genji, then the twins.  _ Somewhere in the back of his mind he registered immense frustration. Now he couldn't even hold himself together anymore, allowing those thoughts that had plagued him before to take over his mind again and again. It was pathetic.

A hand suddenly gripped his shoulder roughly, and he blinked, gaining some awareness. There was a voice, male, barely understandable. Hanzo’s first instinct was to fight, so he lashed out weakly at the figure crouching above him. His attack was easily dodged, and the man kept speaking, his voice low and soothing.

“-zo Shimada, the year is 2076, you’re in an old Overwatch Watchpoint on the Rock of Gibraltar,” the voice slowly became ungarbled as Hanzo’s breaths became longer and he was able to get oxygen in his system. English. Hanzo was suddenly aware of the sweat dripping down his back. He looked up at the man above him, and his eyes latched onto the first thing they could see - a brown cowboy hat, golden badge and bullets lining the top of it.

“Breathing better now?” The owner of the voice, which Hanzo could now identify as Jesse McCree, seemed genuinely concerned. “Here. I’ll help sit you up, okay?” Hanzo nodded, embarrassed, and McCree’s grip on his shoulder tightened and pulled him into a sitting position. His hands were still shaking; he pulled them close to his body and clenched them into fists.

“Now, now, there’s no need to be like that. Ain’t nothing to be embarrassed about, it’s a panic attack. Would ya like me to let go of ya?” McCree’s voice was still low, as though he were attempting to soothe a beast, and it took all of Hanzo’s effort not to grit his teeth.

“Please,” he said curtly. The hand on his shoulder disappeared, but McCree stayed where he was in front of Hanzo. He wasn’t smiling, but he didn’t seem angry, either. His customary serape was wrapped around his shoulders, and his elbows rested on his knees as he crouched.

“Ya dropped your bow,” he said, nodding at the item in question.

“I am aware.”

McCree nodded. “Here.” He stood up, letting out a little groan as he did so, and smiled wryly as he cracked his back. “Damn, I feel old.” He leaned over to grab Storm Bow from where it was a few feet away.

“Do not touch that.” The tone was a lot more caustic than Hanzo intended, but it did the trick; McCree’s hands flew up and he stood up and took a few steps away from the bow.

“Okay, okay, I’ll back off.” Hanzo made an attempt to stand. His legs were still shaky, but he finally managed to pull himself upright and take a few unsteady steps to grab his dropped bow and quiver. McCree watched silently, his hands falling to his waist to hitch themselves in his belt. He finally spoke as Hanzo scooped the last of his arrows into his quiver and stood again.

“I’ll admit I didn’t expect to see anyone when I came to the practice range for a little morning workout, let alone you.” 

Hanzo glared at him. “And what do you mean by that?” McCree seemed to realize what what he had said sounded like and looked slightly sheepish.

“Sorry, no harm meant. I intended to say that I haven’t seen ya around the base much, probably on account of the fact that I’ve been out on a mission most of the time you’ve been here,” he clarified. Hanzo felt some of the tension seep out of his body. “I have been thinkin’ about trying to find you.” The tension immediately returned. “Figured there might be some benefit to us talkin’ a bit. Guess this wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, though.”

“I am sorry to have disturbed you, but I should be off,” Hanzo said. He had no wish to elongate the conversation,and began packing away Storm Bow in its case. “The doctor has already explained to me everything I need to know. I have no intentions to harm Genji, and I will stay out of your way.” He grabbed the case’s handle and began to walk out the door.

“Wait, what? Angie talked to ya? What did she -”

“Thank you for your… assistance,” Hanzo said, cutting McCree off. He gave the man a small nod and ignored him calling after Hanzo as he left the range. Whatever lecture McCree had planned for him, though undoubtedly deserved, he was in no shape to hear it. His stomach was still churning and it took all of his strength to keep from shivering.

There was a message in his inbox when he arrived back at his room. For a moment, he was surprised at the early hour, but he figured that a resident of a military base likely kept earlier hours than the average individual. It was from the gorilla, Winston.

 

_ Mr. Shimada, as we have yet to fully test your skills, I would like you to report to practice range B at 1500 so you can run through our standard testing protocols. Thank you, Winston _

 

Hanzo hesitated. Given his performance in the range just now, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to do well in the planned tests. What would happen if his skills were deemed lacking? They would not let him stay on base and drain their resources, nor would he want to bear the shame that would entail from an event.

It wasn’t as if he could actually refuse, though.

He shot back an affirmative message before sending a message to Mei, inviting her to lunch with him. He could benefit greatly from her presence, both as a distraction and a source of advice. It was midmorning before he received an affirmative message from her. The ding of the notification was enough to rouse him from the light meditation he’d managed to fall into despite his new hyperalertness of the blocked bond.

He was unable to fall back into that state for the rest of the morning and was grateful when noon rolled around and he made his way to the kitchen to get tea started. Mei showed at half past, her smile warm and friendly. He poured her a cup and they sat at the table with their tea and lunches.

“I apologize for how I acted during dinner yesterday,” Hanzo started. Mei waved a hand indifferently.

“There isn’t any need to apologize. It was easy to tell that Genji was on your mind. Did you get a chance to talk to him before he left?” She took a bite of her sandwich.

“Yes,” Hanzo said, nodding. He tapped a finger on the table, trying to figure out his words. “He had something very important that I needed to know before he left. I admit that it was a great relief to learn, but it left me with many doubts in regards to something else.” He grimaced. “I am being extremely vague, sorry. It… it is not something I can quite talk about with someone besides Genji.”

“No worries, Hanzo, really. Talk about it whenever you feel you can,” she replied.

“Thank you.” He took a bite of his own food and chewed in contemplation. “Winston asked me to come to the range this afternoon to show him my various skills, but when I attempted to practice this morning, it did not end well. I fear I will underperform on these tests.”

“I am sure you will do fine, Hanzo. I have no doubt you are a skilled archer. One bad practice does not make you bad every time. You just weren’t ready this morning. Maybe if you relax some this afternoon, you will feel better. Not the best advice, I know, but it is what I have to offer. I myself am not a very good shot.” Mei smiled sheepishly. Hanzo tilted his head, curious. “I haven’t seen much combat; my skills are those I utilize in my lab work. I rely on the freezing effects of my endothermic blaster for the most part.”

“I could give you some tips, if you wish. My specialty may not be firearms, but I have been trained in them. The icicles from your weapon share some similarities to a bullet, at least in how they fire, do they not?”

“Only in the sense that they go fast and horizontal, really. I could show you if you like.” Hanzo could tell she was excited at the prospect of showing off her endothermic blaster by the light in her eyes. 

“I think that would be an excellent idea. I am free for the next couple of hours, and I can think of nothing better to do with my time than assist you.” He smiled, but only just, a vague upturn at the corners of his mouth.

“Really? I will have to grab my blaster from my lab, but if you want to meet in practice range C after we finish our lunch, I believe it is empty for the time being.”

“I would be amenable to that. How is your experiment coming along?” Mei launched into an explanation of her ongoing experiment, and the rest of their lunch was relaxed.

When Hanzo stepped into the practice range with Storm Bow in hand, just in case, he could feel panic rising again, nipping at the back of his mind. He pushed it down the best he could and greeted Mei when she came in. She pulled out her blaster and began explaining the various function and switches, then pressed it into Hanzo’s hands. When Hanzo felt confident enough to fire it, he asked her to step back and took aim.

The first shot flew extremely wide of the target, an expected outcome given he didn’t know how the recoil felt. He readjusted his grip and took a deep breath to steady himself. The second shot was only a few inches short this time. He smirked and took the third shot. Bullseye.

“Amazing! How did you do that?” Mei gasped.

“Come here, I will show you,” Hanzo said. He handed over the blaster and took a step back. “Athena, could you please reset the target?”

“My pleasure.” A new target swooped in to replace the old one as it sunk into the floor.

“You are obviously versed in firearm safety, at least, so I do not believe I have anything to teach you in that respect. Could you position yourself to shoot the target for me?” Mei did so, and Hanzo immediately noticed a few issues. “Here. Do you mind if I move you around a bit?” Mei shook her head, and Hanzo immediately began adjusting her into a more solid stance.

“Obviously you cannot always stand still and shoot, but you should try to maintain the arm positions when firing.” He took a step back. “Take a shot.” Mei was obviously familiar with the recoil, so when she shot it with the improved stance, she was only a few rings off the bullseye.

“Wow! Much better!” She smiled. A smile crept onto his lips, and at that moment he noticed that the panic was gone. 

“There is still more to do, and we have a while yet.” Mei nodded enthusiastically, and they spent the next hour and a half in the range. Part of the way through, Hanzo pulled out his bow, so when it came close to the time he had to meet Winston, he felt sufficiently warmed up.

“Thank you, Hanzo. I mean it,” Mei said as they walked towards practice room B.

“No issue. I do not need to tell you to keep practicing, of course.” They stopped outside the entrance.

Mei smiled. “Of course not.” She checked the time on her phone. “You had better get in there. Good luck! You will do amazing.”

“Thank you.” He gave her a small nod and stepped through the door to meet Winston. The gorilla was waiting with a clipboard. Even though he had set up the meeting, Winston still jumped when he realized Hanzo was in the room.

“Sorry, you startled me,” he said. Hanzo raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. Winston cleared his throat and adjusted his glasses.”I’ll be heading up to the observation deck in just a moment. From there, I’ll direct you through a series of courses and simulations designed to test your accuracy, stealth, and range, among other things. This should take no more than an hour; we are not looking for a precise measurement of skills, but rather a vague estimate of where you are at and what sort of mission you can handle. Before, it would be months before you were declared mission-ready, however, given our current state of affairs…” Winston gestured vaguely around him and trailed off.

“You have to take a few shortcuts. I am aware.” Winston nodded and pushed up his glasses again. An odd tic. Did gorillas even need glasses?

“Yes. I’ll uh, head up then.” Winston stepped into an elevator built into the wall and a few moments later the lights in the observation deck came on. His deep voice came over the speakers. “Athena is currently setting up the first course. Please prepare your weapon and step up to the first station, indicated by the light.” Hanzo did as he was told, slinging his quiver over his back. “This is just a simple target range. Judging by the numbers Athena reported from your previous sessions, this should be a quick warm-up for you.” Hanzo could feel his heart rate start to speed up again as the first target popped up. He cracked his knuckles and took a deep breath before raising his bow. Inhale. Exhale. Pull the drawstring back.

Release.

The arrow landed directly on the bullseye, and Hanzo smiled.

 

\--

 

The tests had become increasingly difficult, but not impossible; when Winston came down, he had a smile on his face.

“Excellent work, Agent Hanzo. Agent Genji was not exaggerating when he told me how skilled you are.”

“Thank you. Should I expect a mission assignment soon, then?” Winston looked down at the chart, considering.

“Possibly. I’ve received some intel I want to take a closer look at, and you might be a perfect fit for what I have in mind. I’ll, ah, get back to you on that. You take the rest of the evening to relax for now.”

Hanzo nodded. “Very well. Have a good afternoon.”

He exited the practice range, rolling his shoulders back to work out some of the aches from the grueling work he had done. He made his way back to his room and took a shower to wash away the sweat of a hard workout. The cool water running down his back made him shiver, but in a way that felt pleasant. The last of the bubbles swirled down the drain as he turned water off and stepped from the stall. 

He allowed himself to think as he dried off. Winston had called him an agent; it was a stark reminder of what was now his reality. He had been so caught up in everything with Genji, Kaba, and the other agents that his new, well,  _ job _ , had been shoved to the back of his mind. This rest period he had now without Genji near to put him on edge was nice - but it couldn’t last forever. Winston had told him to take the evening to relax, however, so Hanzo considered his possibilities before pulling out a tablet and picking out a book to read. 

 

\--

 

Several hours had passed before Hanzo looked up from the book. The sun was starting to go down, and a few of the rays filtered through his window, lighting his room up in a warm orange glow. Hanzo looked up for a second before being struck by inspiration. He hurriedly grabbed his sketchbook from his bag and began to make his way up to the roof. Undoubtedly, the lighting in the garden would be beautiful as the last of the day’s light shone down on them.

He wasn’t wrong. The garden was breathtaking at this time of day, and for once Hanzo bemoaned the fact that he wasn’t practiced in colors. He seated himself at the head of the path and began sketching out the scene in front of him. When he was satisfied with the base of the sketch, he moved, committing the view to memory to fill out details later. He only had the space of a few minutes to catch everything.

It was only when the last rays of sun disappeared behind the horizon did he see the burning end of a cigar ahead of him, past the clearing and on the edge of the roof proper. He drew closer, curious as to who it was. A familiar cowboy hat and serape came into view, and Hanzo began to backpedal as quietly as possible.

“I know you’re there, Shimada.” Hanzo froze. “Ain’t no sense in hiding back there when you were stomping around earlier.” A puff of smoke floated up as McCree tapped some ash from the end of his cigar. Hanzo sighed.

“I apologize for disturbing you. I will leave.”  
McCree looked over his shoulder. “Nah, you weren’t disturbing me. Stay, please.” Hanzo eyed him cautiously. What could this man possibly want? “I wanna talk to ya. I think we got off a bit on the wrong foot.” Hanzo raised an eyebrow. Was he sincere? He seemed to be. Hanzo crossed over to where the cowboy sat, his feet a few inches from the edge of the building. The man had returned to staring out across the ocean, his hat pulled down to conceal his face.

“It is a very long fall. I am not sure your position there is the safest.” McCree let out a quiet chuckle.

“I’ll be fine. Feel free to sit down, Hanzo.” Hanzo did so stiffly, settling himself into a seiza. “I wanted to talk earlier today, but you were in a real hurry to leave. Like I said, I think we got off on the wrong foot.”

“You said neither anything false nor anything I did not deserve. Genji took offense, but I see no reason to find the truth offensive.”

McCree nodded slowly, absorbing the information. “I think I judged ya more harshly than I should’ve. You and I, we’ve got a lot in common, and it would be hypocritical of me to not allow ya a chance to try and make up for your past, given I’m tryin’ to do the same myself. I ain’t gonna go into details, but I’ve got some skeletons of my own. The only difference between you and me is that one of your skeletons is not only walking and breathing, but trying to play nice and make up.

“Don’t get me wrong - what you did to Genji? It ain’t right. He’s your kin.” Hanzo clenched his fists, and McCree took another drag off his cigar before blowing out a stream of smoke. “But I’ve got no moral high ground here. I’ve killed my fair share of innocents and even did dirty work for Overwatch back in the day.” Hanzo cocked his head to the side slightly. Dirty work? He knew that Overwatch’s fall had resulted due to suspicious circumstances, but it had never crossed his mind that any of the agents on base might have been involved. Who else had done “dirty work” for Overwatch? Was Genji one of them?” Jesse continued, cutting short Hanzo’s line of thought. “I was angry when I first saw ya, I’ll admit, but being out of the base really cooled my head a bit. If Genji is vouching for ya, I believe him.” McCree turned his head just enough that Hanzo could see the light reflecting off one of his eyes. “If I find you’ve done anything to him, don’t expect any mercy from me, or anyone on this base.” A shiver ran down Hanzo’s spine. “It’s just how it is. I’m gonna give ya a chance though. You amenable to startin’ over?” Hanzo wiped his palms on his pants and took a deep breath. Silence filled the air between them, Hanzo refusing to make eye contact with the man.

“I would be amenable to that, yes.” He didn’t look at McCree. “I did not come here to make friends with the former members of Overwatch; I came here because Genji asked it of me. The errors of my past are my burden and mine alone, and I do not expect any of you to go lightly on me.” He finally looked up, resolve burning in his eyes as he looked at McCree. The cowboy gave him an appraising look and blew out another puff of smoke before nodding.

“Mmkay. Well,” McCree stood up with a groan and brushed dust from his jeans before holding a hand out to Hanzo. The archer took it hesitantly and McCree pulled him up, but didn’t let go. “The name’s McCree. Jesse McCree.” Hanzo blinked in confusion, then realized what the other man was doing. “My friends call me Jesse, but I think you and I should just stick to McCree for now, got it?”

“Of course. I am Hanzo Shimada; you may call me Hanzo. I am happy to make your acquaintance.” They gave each other’s hand a firm shake before separating. McCree smiled wryly.

“Well, Hanzo, I think I’m gonna head off and hit the hay. You have a good night, now.” McCree tipped his hat, and somewhere inside Hanzo registered a bubble of amusement at the ridiculous action.

“And you as well, McCree.” Hanzo watched McCree’s back as he ambled back to the door, spurs jangling with every step.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all!!! First of all, I’m not dead! Don’t worry! Ok, maybe a little dead, since this is tuesday of my third week back at school. That’s part of the reason it took me _forever_ to update. In the past five weeks I have: spent a week preparing to move/start school, spent a week moving into and adjusting to my apartment, spent a week helping my parents move and adjust to _their_ apartment, and spent two weeks being at school and taking classes. Basically, a lot of shit and a lot of mental (and physical! In the case of moving) effort that has combined with somewhat of a writer’s block that made pumping out this chapter Very Hard. Here it is, though!
> 
> Secondly: If you guys noticed, I made some small edits this past week. It was really nothing major, but I recently got an almost secondary beta that functions kind of as a sensitivity reader, I guess? Seizure7 has spent some time looking over my fic and how I have Hanzo and Genji act vis-à-vis culture and upbringing. While I did an okay job in that manner, she definitely has helped me sharpen those edges and make it fit more. If anyone’s curious as to what exactly I changed, I did keep a record of things I fixed and you can send me an ask on tumblr to explain :D I think accountability is important in something like this, so my goal is to be as transparent as possible. I’ve said it before but I’ll say it again - my goal is to make something that I can be proud of, and if I make a mistake, I encourage my readers to point it out and give me feedback. In general, I would be delighted if you guys threw a message at me on tumblr, because hearing from someone who enjoys my work 100% makes my day. It’s why I love all of your wonderful comments, even if I don’t often respond <3
> 
> Finally! Shout out to my bbff (best beta friend forever) astrotheology for being the Best Beta, and also for reblogging a video of a seal with the caption “1-800-AREYOUSLAPPIN” because I’m sitting here giggling at it. The songs for this chapter are Kesha’s new album and all of the openings to Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure.
> 
> Hoo boy this is long. As always, I’m on tumblr at praesaepe, so throw me an ask! The tag for the fic here has a few little extras if you’re interested :0 Kudos and comments are appreciated, as always. Enjoy!!

Genji arrived back on base a few days later, mentor in tow. Hanzo woke up to a short message from Genji saying he’d arrive at 0900; the archer cursed upon looking over at his clock and seeing the time was 0845. He rushed to get dressed and was down in the loading bay within 10 minutes. The dropship was visible in the distance. McCree was there, too, moving boxes of supplies, his sleeves rolled up past his elbows and letting the early morning sun glint off his prosthetic. He greeted Hanzo with a curt nod as he set down the final box and wiped sweat from his brow. There was a pause as Hanzo tried to figure out how to respond.

“Good morning,” he finally said, returning the nod. McCree leaned against the nearby wall and fidgeted with something in his pocket. Hanzo saw what might be a cigar case slide out of his pocket before the cowboy pushed it back out of sight.

“You waitin’ for your brother to get back?” McCree asked, his fingers tapping on the side of his leg. Hanzo tried not to fidget himself.

“Yes. He messaged me this morning.” McCree nodded and looked Hanzo up and down. A smile tugged at the corner of the cowboy’s lips.

“I’m guessing ya just got up, then,” he said casually. Hanzo blinked owlishly and McCree grinned. “Your hair.” With a frown, Hanzo reached for the top of his head and realized his hair was still down and mussed with sleep. His eyes widened and he patted down his body, searching for his ribbon or at the very least a hair tie, turning up nothing. McCree was obviously holding back a laugh. Hanzo was mortified.

“Here.” McCree shoved a hand into his pocket and pulled out a hair tie. Hanzo struggled to hide his surprise as he took it from him.

“Thank you.” The dropship landed as he put his hair up into its customary ponytail, leaving his bangs and a few stray hairs. The ramp lowered and Genji all but bounded out of the plane. Kaba was not there, and for a second Hanzo wondered where she was before an omnic followed his brother out, the green dragon on his shoulders. The omnic’s clothes were simple; plain yellow pants, and a red cloth that draped from front to back were all that adorned him. What caught Hanzo’s eyes the most were the orbs that floated around the monk - Kaba, from her position on his shoulders, was batting at one with outstretched claws. She overreached and tumbled off his shoulders before letting out an indignant squeak and running after Genji. The scene drew a chuckle from the omnic. Hanzo assumed his shock must’ve shown on his face, because Genji skid to a halt in front of him and cocked his head. Kaba hopped up onto Genji’s shoulder. Hanzo looked at her pointedly.

“Oh, yes,” Genji said, suddenly understanding. “This is my mentor, Zenyatta. Zenyatta, this is Hanzo.” The omnic floated to Genji’s side and held out a hand. Hanzo hesitantly reached out and shook it. He remembered that Hana had mentioned Genji’s mentor was one of the Shambali omnic monks, but actually meeting him was interesting. In all his travels, he had never met any of the Shambali, and he had to admit he had somewhat of a personal interest in them. A Shambali monk had let go of their past in way Hanzo neither could nor thought he deserved, not when Genji was the way he was because of Hanzo’s actions.

“Nice to meet ya, Zenyatta. I’m Jesse McCree,” Jesse said, holding out a hand. Zenyatta shook it as well and looked between him and Hanzo.

“I have been looking forward to meeting you both.” The omnic’s tone remained even, and much to Hanzo’s chagrin he couldn’t decode what Zenyatta was feeling towards him. Was he angry? Disappointed?

“I am… grateful for what you did for Genji,” he said haltingly.

“I saw a troubled soul that needed my assistance; it would have been remiss of me not to offer it to him,” Zenyatta said. “We have learned much from each other.” To McCree, Zenyatta seemed as though he were staring at Genji, but it was obvious to Hanzo that he was looking at the dragon perching on his brother’s shoulder. _Wait,_ Hanzo paused. _Which are his eyes?_ There were six holes on the top of his head, but two rectangles underneath them. It was not unheard of for omnics to have multiple eyes, which left Hanzo glancing between the holes and the rectangles, wondering which were the omnic’s eyes, or if all of them were. He decided to settle on the rectangles and hope he wasn’t wrong.

Zenyatta was looking back at him again, his immobile face making him impossible to read. If he had more body language, Hanzo could unearth something, but the omnic was still. He exuded a sense of calm and control that the archer couldn’t help but envy.

“Did you get Winston’s email this morning, Hanzo?” McCree broke the silence. Hanzo shook his head. “Winston has an assignment for the both of us in a couple of days.”

“The both of you?” Genji asked, looking between McCree and Hanzo. It was easy to hear the underlying implication of _Is that really a good idea?_ in his tone.

“Given the mission and our skill sets, it makes sense. ‘Course, I can’t tell ya anything about it; it is classified until afterwards, after all.” McCree managed to keep a straight face for a total of two seconds before he broke into a wide grin and Genji cracked up. Hanzo tilted his head, confused, before realizing this was clearly some inside joke between the two.

“Classified, yes. So where are you two headed?” Genji asked.

“Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. A while back, Vishkar won a big contract there to do some redevelopment. According to Winston’s intel, the ‘mishap’ at the leading competitor’s office wasn’t quite the accident it seemed to be. Winston wants me and Hanzo to investigate. I’m the stealth, Hanzo’s the backup up high.”

“Stealth?” Hanzo cut in and gave a pointed look at McCree’s spurs. McCree raised an eyebrow.

“You underestimatin’ me, Hanzo?” McCree pulled out a cigar and began lighting it.

“Your fighting ability I do not doubt, however, your…” Hanzo paused, frustrated, and motioned towards McCree’s boots.

“My footsteps?” The cigar caught and McCree took a long drag, looking unimpressed.

“No, the metal things, the-“ he paused and looked at Genji. “ _Hakusha._ ”

“Do ya mean my spurs?” Hanzo gave a curt nod.

“Your spurs would be loud, would they not?” he asked.

“You’d think.” He didn’t elaborate, just stared at Hanzo. Hanzo stared back, the silence slowly inching into awkward territory before Genji spoke up.

“Ok! Well, Hanzo, Jesse, I am going to go help Zenyatta get settled in right now. Will you meet us for lunch, brother?” Hanzo broke eye contact with McCree and looked at his brother to nod.

“I will read Winston’s message  and begin preparations,” he said.

“Good!” Genji clapped a hand on Hanzo’s shoulder, a smile in his voice. Hanzo nodded again as he dropped it and watched his brother and the omnic head out of the hangar door. McCree tipped his hat at Hanzo and left as well. It was only when he was out the door that Hanzo realized he hadn’t heard the jangling of the cowboy’s spurs.

\--

The mission brief was much like McCree’s summary. Winston apparently had reason to believe that the fire at the competitor’s office – a company by the name of Calado – was not the result of faulty gas lines, but intentional sabotage by the Vishkar corporation. It made sense, if it was true that the mayor had been planning on using Calado instead. Hanzo looked over the propositions that each company had made; it was clear that Vishkar’s proposition was objectively better, providing more housing in the slums and being far more organized. He frowned and continued on, hoping he might be able to understand why the government chose Calado over Vishkar, local ties aside. It became clear very quickly.

Vishkar was known worldwide for their urban developments, but there was an underlying dark side to what they did. Their influence in poor areas led to strict curfews and use of the poor as a cheap labor force. The upper class benefited at the heavy expense of the lower class. Hanzo looked back at the plans and grimaced; while the layout was indeed better, it extended much further into the slums – _favelas_ , according to the brief – and made it easy to exploit them. Hanzo shook his head as he finished the brief. Treating the lower class of the city badly would never put you in their favor, but lead them to rise up against you. His father had always treated the less fortunate of Hanamura well. It was much easier to hide the clan’s true activities and recruit when needed.

What troubled Hanzo was the source of the information; namely, the lack of intel on them. All of the papers included were definitely official, at least as far as Hanzo could tell. Only someone on the inside could have possibly attained them; the question, then, was who. Hanzo checked through the list of employees with access to some of that information on site of the new Vishkar headquarters. It was a small list, but one name in particular stood out to him: Satya Vaswani. He had seen that name before. She was listed as one of the most talented architechs in the company, and an extremely loyal one at that. He closed the briefing email and started looking through news articles. She had traveled the world a dozen times over at this point, creating structures that would make ancient architects weep at their beauty. She was definitely not a contender in this list, but neither was anyone else. You _had_ to be loyal, to be that highly ranked.

Hanzo sent Winston an email asking about the source. The information seemed legitimate, but he hadn’t survived ten years with Shimada assassins and other bounty hunters chasing him by remaining complacent. Paranoia was a must in the mercenary business, and he had it in droves. Acting on it was all he could do for now.

\--

Winston’s reply had not been reassuring in the least. The email he had received with the information had been bounced around the globe multiple times, and appeared as though it stopped in Rio. Where in the city specifically he could not say, but he too had assumed it was an inside job, even if none of the ranking on-site employees had ever shown signs of disloyalty. The scientist didn’t want to take any risks, but the information was too solid and he had wanted a good reason to investigate Vishkar for some time now. As long as Hanzo and McCree kept a low profile, the mission itself should run smoothly. Hanzo left to meet his brother, plagued with doubts.

“We are having a picnic!” Hanzo stared at his brother, who was holding a bright blue cooler presumably filled with food.

“A picnic?” He looked between Genji and his mentor, the former rocking on his heels while the latter floated serenely. Hanzo had to wonder how they had come together how they had; even considering how different Genji must have been, their personalities didn’t hold many similarities.

“A picnic! There’s an observation deck that was abandoned when the watchpoint was built and tourists were no longer allowed up here. It has a-”

“Beautiful view of the Alboran?” Hanzo cut him off, a smile on the corner of his lips. “I am familiar. I made the hike up to it about a week ago.” He didn’t mention that he had been avoiding his brother at the time, or the fact that he had spent time sketching. His sketchbook was in his room, on his desk, and he couldn’t imagine showing it to his brother, no matter the progress they had made.

“Then you know it is a perfect place for a picnic! The garden is very nice, but sometimes you have to do a little hiking to really wear off the tension. Besides, I wanted to show my master that observation deck.” The hike to the deck was short - only about 20 minutes or so - but it definitely isolated him with Genji and his mentor. While he was not opposed to the former, he was still unsure of how the latter felt. He would no more want to be stuck a ways away with, say, Tracer, than he would with Zenyatta. On second thought, he scratched that. At least with the British woman, he knew her view was not altogether fond. Zenyatta was a complete enigma. How could he say no to his brother, though, when he had obviously taken some time to plan this?

“Very well,” Hanzo said, attempting to hide his reluctance.

Genji perked up, seemingly incognizant of Hanzo’s internal dialogue. “Great!”

The hike up went fast, if only because Genji kept speaking the entire time, telling Hanzo all of the details about his trip. Zenyatta floated along quietly, occasionally adding a detail that Genji missed or he found important. Hanzo was silent; he wasn’t sure what he could add anyways, and his brother seemed to fill up the space just fine. They reached the observation deck and Genji went right to the edge of the deck and leaned against the railing. Hanzo bit his tongue before he told Genji to be careful.

“Isn’t it beautiful, Master?” Genji said, sweeping his arm out. He turned back towards Zenyatta, eagerly watching the omnic float up to the edge of the deck himself and look across the glittering sea.

“It is wonderful,” he said. “I can see why you enjoy it as much as you do.” Hanzo busied himself opening the cooler and pulling out some of the food Genji had brought with them while they stared at the horizon. When Genji finally pulled away, he looked down at Hanzo with a head tilt the archer had come to understand was something like a smile without his visor off.

“Thank you, Hanzo.” Hanzo nodded and handed him a pre-wrapped sandwich, settling into a seated position on the deck. He was careful to avoid splinters from the old wood. Genji settled beside him and took off his visor, exposing his face. Hanzo tried not to look - even now, the scars that lined the edge of his prosthetic jaw could make Hanzo’s stomach turn with guilt. He bit into his own sandwich.

“Are you getting on a bit better with the other people? Jesse didn’t seem to mind talking with you too much when I got here,” Genji asked.

Hanzo chewed thoughtfully and swallowed before answering. “He and I have found common ground,” he said. “We are far from friendly, but I believe any hostility is behind us, for now.”

“For now? You act as though you expect more later.”

Hanzo shook his head. “I have no wish to incur anyone’s wrath here, but I find it easier to prepare for it regardless.”

“Hanzo…”

“I have become well acquainted with Hana Song and Mei-Ling Zhou,” Hanzo cut him off before he could launch into some long speech. Still, when he looked up, he caught a glimpse of Genji’s worried expression before he broke eye contact. “I visited Mei down in her lab and later helped her with her aim on the practice range. Hana and I occasionally play video games together.”

“That’s good! I never knew Mei before, and I only met Hana when she first showed up at the watchpoint, but they both seem very nice! I am glad you’ve made friends, Hanzo.” Hanzo grimaced. He felt like a child coming home from school and telling his parents about his day; not that he’d ever experienced it firsthand.

He continued to describe some of the events that had passed while Genji was away, careful to edit out any mentions of his breakdowns. It would do him no good to worry his brother with talk like that. Zenyatta remained silent in a way Hanzo found unnerving. Couldn’t the omnic just _react_ to him somehow?

“I haven’t had Bibimbap in a long time. Maybe you guys will let me join in next time,” Genji said, shoving the plastic wrap from his sandwich back in the cooler. “I will be back in a second - I need to relieve myself.” He stood up and walked out of sight, leaving Hanzo with Zenyatta. Hanzo was frozen where he sat, his eyes flicking between the omnic and the ground, the silence palpable.

Zenyatta was the one to break it. “You remind me of your brother in many ways beyond the physical.”

Hanzo blinked. “What do you mean by that?”

“I sense within you the same rage that once consumed Genji,” he said simply.

“Rage?” Hanzo furrowed his brows. “You are mistaken.”

“I have been mistaken about many things, but I can see this feeling clearly. You are angry.”

Hanzo frowned. Who was this omnic to tell him how he felt? He felt himself growing angry at this moment, but to say he had some other rage within him… “We are nothing alike!” he snapped. “Not in that regard. His anger was well-placed, justified. I took his life from him.”

“I apologize if I am causing you discomfort, but I only wish to assist you. Genji has become very important to me, and you are important to him. It would only make sense that I offer you the same help I offered him. It is your choice.”

“I appreciate what you have done for my brother; however, my problems are my own, and I do not need your assistance. I am no charity case.”

“I do not view you as such, but very well,” Zenyatta shrugged elegantly before folding his hands back in his lap. “If you change your mind, the offer remains.”

“Offer?” Genji suddenly appeared in view.

“It is nothing,” Hanzo said tersely, standing and brushing crumbs from his _gi_. “I must head back to the watchpoint. I wish to do further research before my mission, as well as prepare my equipment.”

Genji’s shoulders drooped. “We did not get to talk about much, but very well. We’ll meet again before you leave, I hope,” he said.

“Yes. Thank you for the picnic, Genji. Are you and Zenyatta going to stay up here for longer, or will you hike back down with me?”

“I apologize, but I wish to remain up here with my master for now. We did not have much time to meditate on the journey back, and this is an ideal time.” Hanzo held back a snort. Genji? Meditate? Much really had changed.

“I understand. Have a good afternoon.” He nodded at them both, his nod towards Zenyatta maybe a little more curt than his nod to his brother.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Helloooooo! It's chapter time. It's been a while, I know, but this is a very good and important chapter I've been very excited to write. I hope you guys enjoy it too. I keep forgetting to mention this, but the scene with Hanzo and Mei on the practice range was probably subconsciously influenced by [wyntera's](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wyntera/profile) fic [Popcorn Redemption](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7662643/chapters/17448739), aka, one of my absolute favorite fics. It wasn't intentional but I realized after the fact that it was tangentially similar to a scene from that fic, so I'll just give it a shout-out here. Really good, would recommend.  
> Shout out, of course, to my beta [astrotheology](http://astrotheology.tumblr.com/) for giving the chapter a shakedown. I don't have any particular album for this chapter, but I did listen to a fair amount of Florence + the Machine and the Hiveswap soundtrack.  
> Hit me up on tumblr at [praesaepe](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/) and check out my tag for SaV [here](http://praesaepe.tumblr.com/tagged/scales-and-vectors) that has a few extra bits for you to chew on.

The hum of the dropship was just on the edge of distracting without tipping the scale, the white noise becoming a backdrop against Hanzo’s thoughts. He hadn’t spent any more time with Genji; at least, not alone, without other inhabitants of the watchpoint, particularly his brother’s omnic mentor. Zenyatta claimed not to pity him, but the possibility and the irrational certainty that he did ate at Hanzo.

He looked across the table where McCree was quietly bobbing his head along to music  as he tapped away at his tablet’s screen. Hanzo wondered what the gunslinger was litening to, but the angle was such that he couldn’t see what the man was doing. As the man likely still held less than fond feelings for him, Hanzo chose to forgo asking and pulled out his own tablet instead. It wouldn’t hurt to look at the mission briefing yet again. There were still several hours until they reached Rio, and it wasn’t as if he had read over the information at least ten times at this point. He was looking through the blueprints of the Rio headquarters again when he felt compelled to ask McCree’s opinion.

“Where do you think the information came from?” McCree looked up, pulling one of the buds from his ear. Hanzo continued before he lost his train of thought. “These are all official documents, and the only people who could access this sort of information would have to be deeply embedded in the company or extremely devious. Many of the architechs are brought in as children and their loyalty fostered to an extreme degree, and, according to Winston, the source signal seemed to originate from their headquarters in Rio.” McCree removed his other earbud and held them both between his real fingers.

“I reckon it has to be one of the higher-ups. Definitely not the boss, but one of the on-site employees. Sanjay Korpal was the one who negotiated the deal with the mayor, so he’d have this sort of information. Satya Vaswani is the other high-ranking member on site, but she’s one of those people that Vishkar brought in early, so I’m inclined to believe Korpal sent those files.” McCree rolled the wires between his fingers thoughtfully as he spoke.

Hanzo frowned and leaned forward. “But what motive might he have? He has organized plenty of similar deals before Rio, and there is no particular reason he should have a moral quandary about this one.” He flicked through the articles he had on his tablet and pulled up several that showed Korpal organizing several projects with similar outcomes. McCree grinned and flipped his tablet around as well, revealing he had some of the same articles up. Hanzo’s eyebrows flew up before he schooled his expression.

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” McCree said. “What do you have so far?”

“I have looked at the differences in each of the deals, from start to finish, and no pattern seems to be arising. They all have similar courses and similar outcomes, whether or not they involved Korpal.”

McCree nodded in agreement and flicked through the articles on his tablet, brow furrowing. “What about Vaswani?” he said, looking up. “Have you looked into her at all?”

Some. Many articles speak of her achievements as an architech, but very little speak of her background," Hanzo said, pulling up an article and handing his tablet to McCree. He waited a minute for the man to read through it before he continued speaking. “She is one of the top architechs in the company. From what I can tell, she was born in the slums in Hyderabad and picked up by Vishkar very young. They laud her as proof of Vishkar’s good work.”

“Not exactly a prime candidate for company betrayal,” McCree noted, handing the tablet back and sitting back in his seat.

“That is what I thought initially, but maybe we were wrong.” Hanzo stared down at the tablet in his hands. “As I said before, she was with Vishkar from a young age. Maybe it took Vishkar's sabotage of Calado to show her the corruption.” McCree looked at Hanzo with keen eyes before making a hum of assent.

“You may be right there. Regardless, I can’t really bring myself to trust what we have, so we’re gonna be careful on this op,” McCree said. He tapped a few options on his screen and set the tablet down. A 2-D projection of a floorplan rose from the screen to hover above the table.. “This here is the supposed layout of the building. Let’s go through the details again.”

 

\--

 

“Are you in position, Agent McCree?” Hanzo was crouched on the rooftop of the tallest nearby building - not very high, considering the squat nature of most of the architecture in this section of the city. He didn’t like it, and neither did McCree. If any trouble were to occur, it would take him a great deal of effort to reach the other agent. Their timing allowed for the possibility, but it was not the optimal scenario. It also left Hanzo feeling particularly exposed, as there was very little cover on the roof. If one of the guards glanced out the window and saw someone one the roof outside Vishkar-designated curfew, there would be a problem.

“Entering now,” McCree responded. Hanzo loosed one of his sonar arrows and heard it hit the wall of the compound with a slight _thunk_. His contacts came online and revealed the outlines of the people inside. He was long used to the sting, but his eyes still reflexively blinked.

“All guards in proper positions. You will be able to continue upward in just a moment,” he said. “All clear.” The outline outline with McCree's distinctive wide-brimmed hat disappeared from sonar range as he entered and climbed up the stairwell, and Hanzo pulled out another sonar arrow, notching it and firing it at the building. “Clear.”

They continued this way for several minutes, Hanzo checking guard positions before McCree ascended. It was an imperfect system, but what they had to work with. Hanzo kept careful track of his sonar arrows; he only had so many for this mission, and he didn’t want to run out before McCree finished. An arrow lodged itself in between the eleventh and twelfth floors and began pinging off of something not mapped by guard routes.

“Agent McCree, there is someone on the floor above you showing anomalous movement patterns,” Hanzo said urgently. McCree, who was standing on the edge of Hanzo’s range, immediately froze.

“Is it a guard? There’s no indication I’ve been noticed,” McCree’s voice came in a hushed whisper.

“The silhouette is different from the other guards I have pinged. Just over five feet, movement suggests he, too, is trying to avoid attention,” Hanzo said, eyes trained on the figure. “I doubt you will be able to avoid running into him.”

“How fast do ya think you can get above him? If he’s gotten this high, he’s probably got some idea of the patrols and a way to loop the cameras too.” Hanzo rolled the arrow he was holding between his fingers for a moment as he thought.

“One patrol of those three floors. The man is going to need to hide before the next round; I can get above him in that time and we can close on him from above and below. We are lucky this happened now, rather than when you were near the top.”

“Do that. I’ll wait here,” McCree said. The connection went silent. Hanzo strapped his bow to his back and pulled on his climbing gloves. The smooth exterior walls of Vishkar’s headquarters loomed above him. His prosthetics made climbing easy when there was something to grab, but in situations such as this, he needed to use the gloves he had commissioned long ago to get to the 13th floor.

He ascended the wall as quickly as he could manage, the pointed tips of his prosthetics carving chunks into the wall as moved upwards, creating footholds in the hard light construct. Hanzo couldn’t hold back a tick of amusement; Vishkar spoke a lot about the durability of their hard light constructs, but they were still easy to break, given the right materials. Still, it wasn’t easy, and he was breathing heavily by the time he reached his destination. He considered the window to his right, then pulled out a sonar arrow and stuck it on the wall. There was no one on the other side, as he predicted, so he retrieved a small device from one of his satchels and stuck it to the top of the window.

“This may be loud,” he said quietly into his comm as he adjusted dials. “I will have to shatter the glass to get in.”

“We don’t have much choice. The patrol’s still down a floor from you, so you might have to be ready to dispatch them if they come to check up on you. No alarms should go off as long as Winston’s bug is still working.”

“Very well.” Hanzo nodded and pressed the activation button, quickly moving a couple of feet away. There was a low hum of vibration and the window shattered, most of the glass falling inside onto the smooth floor of the office. Hanzo grabbed the device and put it back in his satchel before swinging into the office, landing with a quiet but unavoidable _crunch_. He quickly moved over to the door and waited. For a tense couple of minutes, there was no sound, but the silence was broken by footsteps coming up the stairway across the hall. Hanzo settled himself with a few breaths.

The footsteps approached, coming up to almost right outside the door - and moved on without pause. They hadn’t heard, which meant the stranger below likely hadn’t either. Hanzo waited another minute for the patrol to turn, the quietly opened the door and crept across the hall to the staircase. He descended quickly and paused at the door frame.

“I am in position,” he said softly.

“I’ll come up through the other staircase and we can sweep through. One of us is bound to run into him. Copy?”  
“Copied, Agent McCree.” He pulled his bow from his back and grabbed an arrow, loosely resting it on the bow.

“Go.” Hanzo entered the hallway and moved slowly down it, properly notching his bow as he did so. His footsteps were as close to silent as possible, his breath low and steady. He turned the corner carefully, bow raised, and put it down when he saw McCree at the other end of the hall. The man gave him a questioning look, and he shook his head in response.

There was a sudden clatter from a door at McCree’s end of the hallway. Both of the men froze. There was no other noise. McCree nodded at the door and Hanzo quickly crept over to him and stood at the other side of the door frame. The gunslinger held his gun firmly at the ready, gave Hanzo one last look, and swung the door open. He stepped in quickly and Hanzo followed, closing the door behind him and raising his bow once again. It was one of the labs for the engineers to experiment with new technology Vishkar was developing; Winston had been interested, but that had taken a lower priority to finding more about the Calado incident.

Counters lined the edges of the room, with cabinets attached to the wall starting a foot or so above them. The main lights were off, leaving the only light source as the fluorescent bulbs hidden on the bottoms of the cabinets and the blue glow of the holographic worktables that took up most of the floor space. It cast eerie shadows in a room that felt clinical in design. Various parts and blueprints were scattered across the tables. A short man with long dreadlocks up in a ponytail was standing at a table in the middle of the room, examining something settled on top of it. His head snapped up when the pair entered, blinking wildly at the glare from the hall behind them, and the glow of the table left half his face in shadow. His expression was frozen in shock for a moment before he snatched up the object - looking strangely enough like a megaphone - and pointed it directly at them.

“I’d recommend you put that down, now,” McCree said. His revolver was trained squarely on the young man. The man’s eyes flicked between that and Hanzo’s bow, drawn taut. “You don’t look like Vishkar. Why don’t you just put that thing down and we can have a little talk.”

The man squinted at them. “Who are you? I don’t really know what this does, but I’ll shoot.” McCree grinned easily, but his hand was firm on his gun as he responded.

“I’m more interested in who you are, and how you managed to get so far up here. We’re not Vishkar, but you don’t need to know more right now.”

The man shook his head. “I’m sorry guys, but that’s not enough. I need some answers. Why are you here?”

“You are not in a place to negotiate,” Hanzo said in a clipped tone. “I would recommend you put the weapon down. I would rather not risk injury to myself or my partner.”

“Ok, you know what?” McCree cut in before the other man could respond. “I’m gonna put my gun away, you’re gonna put that thing down, and then my partner will put down his bow and we can have a little chat. He’s right. I don’t want anyone to get needlessly hurt.”

The man seemed to consider it before replying, keeping his eyes on both of them. “Deal.”

McCree nodded. “I’ll be real slow about it, see?” McCree slowly holstered his weapon and raised his hands. “Your turn. I know you probably don’t put much stock in it, but you have my word my partner won’t shoot you.” The man hesitated. “We got the drop on you when we opened the door and could’ve killed you then. We didn’t.” After a moment, he lowered the weapon back to the table. Hanzo waited for it to be out of his hand before he carefully let the string slack and lowered his bow. “Good. Let’s talk.”

“Fine. Who are you, and what are you doing here? What do you want with Vishkar?” The man rested his hands against the surface of the table.

“We’re investigating them after what happened with Calado. Something about it smelled fishy, and we’re looking for some concrete confirmation of that.”

The man snorted. “Fishy? Yeah, sure, to put it lightly. Ask anyone from that area of town; they all saw that architech Vaswani standing outside the rubble of the building. I’d bet anything she planted the bomb herself.”

Hanzo frowned. “Vaswani was at the site of the explosion?” He asked as he looked over at McCree. The cowboy looked back, his brow furrowed.

“Some people said they watched her pull a little girl from the fire, but I don’t really buy into that. Even if she did, it was probably a ploy to hide her involvement. Vishkar is full of snakes.”

“Why are you here, then?” McCree asked. “Who are you? I’d guess you’re from around here, at least?”

“I’m from one of the favelas Vishkar is developing. They said things would be better, but they lied. It’s gotten worse, so I came here to see what I could find to push them out.” Hanzo noted that the man seemed unable to be completely still, constantly tapping his fingers rhythmically on the table. “Who is ‘we’? It can’t just be you two, and I know the government is tied up in this too, so you have to belong to something else.”

“That’s where I gotta keep quiet, but I think if I make a call later, we might be able to discuss that more. Right now, we’re in the middle of something.”

“The next patrol will pass come through this floor in approximately ten minutes. I suggest we move on,” Hanzo broke in. “We still have to complete our mission. No doubt security will be heightened after the discover the bug in their system and the window I had to break.”

“Mission?” The man broke into a small grin of disbelief. “You do sound pretty official. What are your names?” Hanzo looked at McCree.

“You can call me Morricone. This here is my partner-”

“Raijin.” Hanzo cut McCree off before he could assign some asinine name.  “Are you sure this is advisable, Morricone? This man is an unknown.” The cover name felt strange on his tongue, but he persisted, giving McCree a hard look.

“Like you said, we don’t have much of an option. Even if that bug passes through undetected - something our big friend doubted - your broken window will sure tip them off. He seems to have good intentions, at least.” There was an unspoken _but we can easily take him down if it comes to it_ that Hanzo parsed from McCree’s gaze. The man’s tapping seemed to reverberate in the silence for a moment.

“Very well,” Hanzo finally said begrudgingly. He shot a suspicious look at the man. “What is your name?”

“Since we’re in the habit of giving out fake names, you can call me Saci,” the man said. He looked down at the weapon still sitting out on the table. “I’m going to take this with me, I think. You’ll forgive me if I feel a little exposed without something to shoot, and this thing is interesting enough anyways.” He picked it up and began turning it over in his hands. Hanzo had to resist the urge to reach for Storm Bow. “It’s some sort of sound amplification device, if I’m reading these blueprints right - and sound is kinda my thing. I might be able to mod it into something useful.” Saci grinned at Hanzo and McCree. McCree shrugged, and Saci shifted the weapon to his left hand as he pulled a USB drive from a slot in the table. “Blueprints too. I was downloading them before you came in.”

“Fair enough. We better get going, because our goal is an office a few floors up and if we wait any longer we’ll have to wait for the guard shift to pass and risk them finding the window,” he said, pulling out his phone.

“Am I to continue to accompany you, then? It would be too time-consuming for me to get back to my previous position.”

McCree scratched his chin. “I suppose so. We won’t have as much surveillance, but we’ll make do. Raijin, can you check the hallway with an arrow before we go?”

Hanzo put away the normal arrow he still had in his hand and grabbed a sonic arrow. He pressed the tip to activate it and blinked as his contacts turned on. “It is clear.”

“I think our best bet is you carrying it and keeping an eye out,” McCree said, unholstering his gun. “I’ll keep ol’ Peacekeeper here at the ready in case we run into trouble.”

“You named your gun Peacekeeper? I like it,” Saci said. McCree smiled at him and pushed the brim of his hat up with the barrel.

“She’s served me well,” he said. Hanzo threw a sideways glance at the gun. He had seen it plenty of times, but never bothered to look closely. It was indeed a fine weapon with a fitting name for a character like McCree. McCree put his hand on the door handle and gave one final nod to Hanzo and Saci before opening the door. There was an awkward pause as the two stood next to the door, trying to get the other to go first, before Saci let out a resigned sigh and followed McCree. Hanzo took up the rear, creeping silently down the hall behind the other two men.

When they reached the stairwell, McCree looked back at Hanzo and nodded towards the steps in front of him. Hanzo took it as a signal to move to the front and use sonar to check, and he did so begrudgingly, giving Saci a hard look as he passed. They all ascended the stairs, Hanzo leading now, keeping his eyes moving to check for any ping from the sonar. It was a quick trip to the target floor, and they managed to get through the hallways unhindered to what the floor layout said was the office of Sanjay Korpal. McCree was reaching for the decryption device Winston had given them, but as he edged closer to the door, it slid upon, clearly unlocked. All three men froze in the doorway. The only reason that the door would be unlocked is if the room itself was inhabited. They had company.

McCree took the initiative and raised his gun; Hanzo pulled an arrow from his quiver, and Saci turned his own weapon over in his hands before holding it up like a normal gun. They all exchanged a glance and took a step into the room. The front section bared some resemblance to an office, but it was clearly used very little. Everything in the room was neat and spotless, with none of the furniture, sparse as it was, out of place. A secondary door was in the back right corner of the room. It was hard light, same as the rest of the room, and had a holographic blue tinge. McCree jerked his head towards the door and the three of them crossed the room, pausing at the door. It was unlocked as well. They paused, and Hanzo listened for any sign of movement in the other room. There was none. McCree gestured to Hanzo’s quiver, and Hanzo realized he was asking for a sonar arrow. He nodded and pulled one out, pressing the tip and activating it.

“One occupant, far side of the room, turned away from the door,” he whispered. McCree nodded.

“On three,” he whispered. “One.” He held up three fingers, then two, then one. McCree went through the door first, and Hanzo could only see him moving for a split second before a blue streak of light shot from the top of the door and hit him in the back, making him gasp in pain. Hanzo grabbed his arm and pulled him back, then grabbed one of his scatter arrows from his pack. He took quick aim and released the arrow. There was a yelp of pain and a rain of sparks from above the door as one of the segments of his arrow buried itself into whatever object was above the door and destroyed its inner circuits. Hanzo drew a normal arrow and strung it, coming through the doorway and immediately swinging the point towards the person inside. Beyond the tip of the arrow, a figure in a white dress straightened up from behind the table where they had been crouched, a hand clamped to their cheek. They stared at Hanzo, their expression a mix of fear and fury, but it quickly morphed into one of disgust as they - no, she - pulled her hand from her face and saw the blood that was dripping down the palm onto the floor. There was a momentary pause before she looked up, and beneath the furrowed brow and long, red scratch, Hanzo recognized her. Satya Vaswani glared at him with cold eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple culture notes! [Saci](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saci_\(Brazilian_folklore\)) is a trickster in Brazilian folklore that remains popular partially due to his role in a children's book series. McCree and Hanzo's names were obviously fake (and made references) and Lúcio decided to pull reference from his own background for a fake name.  
> [Raijin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raijin), in comparison, is a Shinto god of lightning, thunder, and storms. I've mentioned him in the past in relation to Raijū, Hanzo's dragon, because Raijū is the name of Raijin's companion. I feel like Raijin has a sort of interesting parallel to Hanzo because he's known to challege Fūjin, the wind god, who is sometimes depicted as a green oni. Fūjin is born of Izanami, same as Raijin, and while nothing I find ever really lists them as brothers, they are born of the same mother.  
> As always I encourage you to look into it yourself, because it's super interesting.
> 
> My beta when I explained Hanzo's fake name:  
> jesse: im gonna name myself after the composer for the best wild west movie ever!!!  
> hanzo: i am the Storm God, flanked by my beast of thunder Raiju, locked in eternal conflict with my brother, the howling wind  
> jesse: sick! my first name is gonna be joel :)


End file.
